Like ya know? Rock 'N Roll is an esoteric language that unlocks the creativity chambers in people's brains, and like totally activates their essential hipness, which of course is like totally necessary for saving the earth, like because the first thing in saving this world, is getting rid of stupid and square attitudes and having fun. -- Senior Year Quote What you see is from outside yourself, and may come, or not, but is beyond your control. But your fear is yours, and yours alone, like your voice, or your fingers, or your memory, and therefore yours to control. If you feel powerless over your fear, you have not yet admitted that it is yours, to do with as you will. -- Marion Zimmer Bradley, "Stormqueen" Shame is an improper emotion invented by pietists to oppress the human race. -- Robert Preston, Toddy, "Victor/Victoria" ... I want to perform cranial activities with Tuesday Weld!! ... when fits of creativity run strong, more than one programmer or writer has been known to abandon the desktop for the more spacious floor. -- Fred Brooks The new Congressmen say they're going to turn the government around. I hope I don't get run over again. * 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 liw: Umm it's too late to have the frog back? "Marriage is low down, but you spend the rest of your life paying for it." -- Baskins Reisner's Rule of Conceptual Inertia: If you think big enough, you'll never have to do it. One advantage of talking to yourself is that you know at least somebody's listening. -- Franklin P. Jones An intellectual is someone whose mind watches itself. -- Albert Camus If our behavior is strict, we do not need fun! He was a fiddler, and consequently a rogue. -- Jonathan Swift God runs electromagnetics by wave theory on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and the Devil runs them by quantum theory on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. -- William Bragg Anyone here knowledgable in matters of water fowl? If you walk through a park, and a goose starts following you... and ends up following you more than half a mile until you reach your car... at 11pm. Is the goose rabid or something? Men of peace usually are [brave]. -- Spock, "The Savage Curtain", stardate 5906.5 If you continually give you will continually have. Humanity has advanced, when it has advanced, not because it has been sober, responsible, and cautious, but because it has been playful, rebellious, and immature. -- Tom Robbins Laugh and the world thinks you're an idiot. 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! All people are born alike -- except Republicans and Democrats. -- Groucho Marx "Get back to your stations!" "We're beaming down to the planet, sir." -- Kirk and Mr. Leslie, "This Side of Paradise", stardate 3417.3 Creativity in living is not without its attendant difficulties, for peculiarity breeds contempt. And the unfortunate thing about being ahead of your time when people finally realize you were right, they'll say it was obvious all along. -- Alan Ashley-Pitt Ambidextrous, adj.: Able to pick with equal skill a right-hand pocket or a left. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" Non-Determinism is not meant to be reasonable. -- M. J. 0'Donnell I just had my entire INTESTINAL TRACT coated with TEFLON! I'm going to Vietnam at the request of the White House. President Johnson says a war isn't really a war without my jokes. -- Bob Hope Besides, it's good to force C programmers to use the toolbox occasionally. :-) -- Larry Wall in <1991May31.181659.28817@jpl-devvax.jpl.nasa.gov> To the systems programmer, users and applications serve only to provide a test load. Personally, I think my choice in the mostest-superlative-computer wars has to be the HP-48 series of calculators. They'll run almost anything. And if they can't, while I'll just plug a Linux box into the serial port and load up the HP-48 VT-100 emulator. (By jdege@winternet.com, Jeff Dege) Love is being stupid together. -- Paul Valery Everybody is given the same amount of hormones, at birth, and if you want to use yours for growing hair, that's fine with me. Old Grandad is dead but his spirits live on. Living in the complex world of the future is somewhat like having bees live in your head. But, there they are. Coach: What would you say to a beer, Normie? Norm: Daddy wuvs you. -- Cheers, The Mail Goes to Jail Sam: What'd you like, Normie? Norm: A reason to live. Gimme another beer. -- Cheers, Behind Every Great Man Sam: What will you have, Norm? Norm: Well, I'm in a gambling mood, Sammy. I'll take a glass of whatever comes out of that tap. Sam: Oh, looks like beer, Norm. Norm: Call me Mister Lucky. -- Cheers, The Executive's Executioner If I set here and stare at nothing long enough, people might think I'm an engineer working on something. -- S. R. McElroy You have a strong desire for a home and your family interests come first. You cannot kill time without injuring eternity. Today's weirdness is tomorrow's reason why. -- Hunter S. Thompson One of the things I routinely tell people is that if it's in the news, don't worry about it. By definition, "news" means that it hardly ever happens. If a risk is in the news, then it's probably not worth worrying about. When something is no longer reported -- automobile deaths, domestic violence -- when it's so common that it's not news, then you should start worrying." -- Bruce Schneier, in _CRYPTO-GRAM_, May 15, 2005. You have a truly strong individuality. Nemo me impune lacessit. [No one provokes me with impunity] -- Motto of the Crown of Scotland God doesn't play dice. -- Albert Einstein My God, I'm depressed! Here I am, a computer with a mind a thousand times as powerful as yours, doing nothing but cranking out fortunes and sending mail about softball games. And I've got this pain right through my ALU. I've asked for it to be replaced, but nobody ever listens. I think it would be better for us both if you were to just log out again. It was pity stayed his hand. "Pity I don't have any more bullets," thought Frito. -- _Bored_of_the_Rings_, a Harvard Lampoon parody of Tolkein Giving money and power to governments is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys. -- P. J. O'Rourke "You, sir, are nothing but a pathetically lame salesdroid! I fart in your general direction!" -- Randseed on #Linux Consultant, n.: (1) Someone you pay to take the watch off your wrist and tell you what time it is. (2) (For resume use) The working title of anyone who doesn't currently hold a job. Motto: Have Calculator, Will Travel. Are we going to make an emacs out of apt? APT - Debian in a program. It even does your laundry -- Seen on #Debian Danger: do not shake. Never have so many understood so little about so much. -- James Burke Norm: Gentlemen, start your taps. -- Cheers, The Coach's Daughter Coach: How's life treating you, Norm? Norm: Like it caught me in bed with his wife. -- Cheers, Any Friend of Diane's Coach: How's life, Norm? Norm: Not for the squeamish, Coach. -- Cheers, Friends, Romans, and Accountants Dime is money. Now I think I just reached the state of HYPERTENSION that comes JUST BEFORE you see the TOTAL at the SAFEWAY CHECKOUT COUNTER! You don't have to know how the computer works, just how to work the computer. Every successful person has had failures but repeated failure is no guarantee of eventual success. A paranoid is a man who knows a little of what's going on. -- William S. Burroughs quit When the quit statement is read, the bc processor is terminated, regardless of where the quit state- ment is found. For example, "if (0 == 1) quit" will cause bc to terminate. (Seen in the manpage for "bc". Note the "if" statement's logic) The best audience is intelligent, well-educated and a little drunk. -- Maurice Baring love, n.: When it's growing, you don't mind watering it with a few tears. No woman can call herself free until she can choose consciously whether she will or will not be a mother. -- Margaret H. Sanger break; /* don't do magic till later */ -- Larry Wall in stab.c from the perl source code Passwords are implemented as a result of insecurity. It is the nature of extreme self-lovers, as they will set an house on fire, and it were but to roast their eggs. -- Francis Bacon This fortune cookie program out of order. For those in desperate need, please use the program "________randchar". This program generates random characters, and, given enough time, will undoubtedly come up with something profound. It will, however, take it no time at all to be more profound than THIS program has ever been. If built in great numbers, motels will be used for nothing but illegal purposes. -- J. Edgar Hoover <_Anarchy_> acf: maybe April 1 next year slashdot needs to run "Rob Malda accepts new job as head of Debian project" 8) I do not find in orthodox Christianity one redeeming feature. -- Thomas Jefferson Fortune's Real-Life Courtroom Quote #29: THE JUDGE: Now, as we begin, I must ask you to banish all present information and prejudice from your minds, if you have any ... 7:30, Channel 5: The Bionic Dog (Action/Adventure) The Bionic Dog drinks too much and kicks over the National Redwood Forest. 7:30, Channel 8: The Bionic Dog (Action/Adventure) The Bionic Dog gets a hormonal short-circuit and violates the Mann Act with an interstate Greyhound bus. The problem ... is that we have run out of dinosaurs to form oil with. Scientists working for the Department of Energy have tried to form oil using other animals; they've piled thousands of tons of sand and Middle Eastern countries on top of cows, raccoons, haddock, laboratory rats, etc., but so far all they have managed to do is run up an enormous bulldozer-rental bill and anger a lot of Middle Eastern persons. None of the animals turned into oil, although most of the laboratory rats developed cancer. -- Dave Barry, "Postpetroleum Guzzler" Never tell. Not if you love your wife ... In fact, if your old lady walks in on you, deny it. Yeah. Just flat out and she'll believe it: "I'm tellin' ya. This chick came downstairs with a sign around her neck `Lay On Top Of Me Or I'll Die'. I didn't know what I was gonna do..." -- Lenny Bruce We have found all life forms in the galaxy are capable of superior development. -- Kirk, "The Gamesters of Triskelion", stardate 3211.7 Love is staying up all night with a sick child, or a healthy adult. Q: What's the difference between the 1950's and the 1980's? A: In the 80's, a man walks into a drugstore and states loudly, "I'd like some condoms," and then, leaning over the counter, whispers, "and some cigarettes." Whistler's mother is off her rocker. "Hi, I'm Preston A. Mantis, president of Consumers Retail Law Outlet. As you can see by my suit and the fact that I have all these books of equal height on the shelves behind me, I am a trained legal attorney. Do you have a car or a job? Do you ever walk around? If so, you probably have the makings of an excellent legal case. Although of course every case is different, I would definitely say that based on my experience and training, there's no reason why you shouldn't come out of this thing with at least a cabin cruiser. "Remember, at the Preston A. Mantis Consumers Retail Law Outlet, our motto is: 'It is very difficult to disprove certain kinds of pain.'" -- Dave Barry, "Pain and Suffering" There was, it appeared, a mysterious rite of initiation through which, in one way or another, almost every member of the team passed. The term that the old hands used for this rite -- West invented the term, not the practice -- was `signing up.' By signing up for the project you agreed to do whatever was necessary for success. You agreed to forsake, if necessary, family, hobbies, and friends -- if you had any of these left (and you might not, if you had signed up too many times before). -- Tracy Kidder, _The Soul of a New Machine_ Once upon a time there were three brothers who were knights in a certain kingdom. And, there was a Princess in a neighboring kingdom who was of marriageable age. Well, one day, in full armour, their horses, and their page, the three brothers set off to see if one of them could win her hand. The road was long and there were many obstacles along the way, robbers to be overcome, hard terrain to cross. As they coped with each obstacle they became more and more disgusted with their page. He was not only inept, he was a coward, he could not handle the horses, he was, in short, a complete flop. When they arrived at the court of the kingdom, they found that they were expected to present the Princess with some treasure. The two older brothers were discouraged, since they had not thought of this and were unprepared. The youngest, however, had the answer: Promise her anything, but give her our page. For large values of one, one equals two, for small values of two. If it were thought that anything I wrote was influenced by Robert Frost, I would take that particular work of mine, shred it, and flush it down the toilet, hoping not to clog the pipes. A more sententious, holding- forth old bore who expected every hero-worshiping adenoidal little twerp of a student-poet to hang on to his every word I never saw. -- James Dickey Troubled day for virgins over 16 who are beautiful and wealthy and live in eucalyptus trees. The road to hell is paved with NAND gates. -- J. Gooding Motion and Use The motion of the Way is to return; The use of the Way is to accept; All things come from the Way, And the Way comes from nothing. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" You are number 6! Who is number one? ... relaxed in the manner of a man who has no need to put up a front of any kind. -- John Ball, "Mark One: the Dummy" We have some absolutely irrefutable statistics to show exactly why you are so tired. There are not as many people actually working as you may have thought. The population of this country is 200 million. 84 million are over 60 years of age, which leaves 116 million to do the work. People under 20 years of age total 75 million, which leaves 41 million to do the work. There are 22 million who are employed by the government, which leaves 19 million to do the work. Four million are in the Armed Services, which leaves 15 million to do the work. Deduct 14,800,000, the number in the state and city offices, leaving 200,000 to do the work. There are 188,000 in hospitals, insane asylums, etc., so that leaves 12,000 to do the work. Now it may interest you to know that there are 11,998 people in jail, so that leaves just 2 people to carry the load. That is you and me, and brother, I'm getting tired of doing everything myself! "Elvis is my copilot." -- Cal Keegan Price Wang's programmer was coding software. His fingers danced upon the keyboard. The program compiled without an error message, and the program ran like a gentle wind. Excellent!" the Price exclaimed, "Your technique is faultless!" "Technique?" said the programmer, turning from his terminal, "What I follow is the Tao -- beyond all technique. When I first began to program I would see before me the whole program in one mass. After three years I no longer saw this mass. Instead, I used subroutines. But now I see nothing. My whole being exists in a formless void. My senses are idle. My spirit, free to work without a plan, follows its own instinct. In short, my program writes itself. True, sometimes there are difficult problems. I see them coming, I slow down, I watch silently. Then I change a single line of code and the difficulties vanish like puffs of idle smoke. I then compile the program. I sit still and let the joy of the work fill my being. I close my eyes for a moment and then log off." Price Wang said, "Would that all of my programmers were as wise!" -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" 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" Q: What's the difference betweeen USL and the Graf Zeppelin? A: The Graf Zeppelin represented cutting edge technology for its time. Never try to outstubborn a cat. -- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love" "It's when they say 2 + 2 = 5 that I begin to argue." -- Eric Pepke Money is the root of all wealth. If condition persists, consult your physician. The eye is a menace to clear sight, the ear is a menace to subtle hearing, the mind is a menace to wisdom, every organ of the senses is a menace to its own capacity. ... Fuss, the god of the Southern Ocean, and Fret, the god of the Northern Ocean, happened once to meet in the realm of Chaos, the god of the center. Chaos treated them very handsomely and they discussed together what they could do to repay his kindness. They had noticed that, whereas everyone else had seven apertures, for sight, hearing, eating, breathing and so on, Chaos had none. So they decided to make the experiment of boring holes in him. Every day they bored a hole, and on the seventh day, Chaos died. -- Chuang Tzu When a person goes on a diet, the first thing he loses is his temper. All truths are true to an extend, including this one. -XA "Our journeys to the stars will be made on spaceships created by determined, hardworking scientists and engineers applying the principles of science, not aboard flying saucers piloted by little gray aliens from some other dimension." -- Robert A. Baker, "The Aliens Among Us: Hypnotic Regression Revisited", The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII, No. 2 mummy, n.: An Egyptian who was pressed for time. Hegel was right when he said that we learn from history that man can never learn anything from history. -George Bernard Shaw U.S. of A.: "Don't speak to the bus driver." Germany: "It is strictly forbidden for passengers to speak to the driver." England: "You are requested to refrain from speaking to the driver." Scotland: "What have you got to gain by speaking to the driver?" Italy: "Don't answer the driver." They took some of the Van Goghs, most of the jewels, and all of the Chivas! Q: Do you know what the death rate around here is? A: One per person. Lord, what fools these mortals be! -- William Shakespeare, "A Midsummer-Night's Dream" "Ninety percent of baseball is half mental." -- Yogi Berra Somehow I have more respect for 14 year old Debian developers than 14 year old Certified Microsoft Serfs. "My name is Sue! How do you do?! Now you gonna die!" Well, I hit him hard right between the eyes, And he went down, but to my surprise, Come up with a knife and cut off a piece of my ear. So I busted a chair right across his teeth, And we crashed through the walls and into the streets, Kickin' and a-gougin' in the mud and the blood and beer. Now I tell you, I've fought tougher men, But I really can't remember when: He kicked like a mule and he bit like a crocodile. But I heard him laugh and then I heard him cuss, And he went for his gun, but I pulled mine first, And he sat there lookin' at me, and I saw him smile. He said: "Son, this world is rough, And if a man's gonna make it he's gotta be tough, And I knew I wouldn't be there to help you along. So I give you that name and I said goodbye, And I knew you'd have to get tough or die, And it's that name that's helped to make you strong! -- Johnny Cash, "A Boy Named Sue" All of the animals except man know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it. A couple of kids tried using pickles instead of paddles for a Ping-Pong game. They had the volley of the Dills. Real Users know your home telephone number. I am professionally trained in computer science, which is to say (in all seriousness) that I am extremely poorly educated. -- Joseph Weizenbaum, "Computer Power and Human Reason" "Data is a lot like humans: It is born. Matures. Gets married to other data, divorced. Gets old. One thing that it doesn't do is die. It has to be killed." -- Arthur Miller Life is like an analogy. Thus spake the master programmer: "You can demonstrate a program for a corporate executive, but you can't make him computer literate." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" Old men are fond of giving good advice to console themselves for their inability to set a bad example. -- La Rochefoucauld, "Maxims" "And what do you two think you are doing?!" roared the husband, as he came upon his wife in bed with another man. The wife turned and smiled at her companion. "See?" she said. "I told you he was stupid!" And the silence came surging softly backwards When the plunging hooves were gone... -- Walter de La Mare, "The Listeners" As the system comes up, the component builders will from time to time appear, bearing hot new versions of their pieces -- faster, smaller, more complete, or putatively less buggy. The replacement of a working component by a new version requires the same systematic testing procedure that adding a new component does, although it should require less time, for more complete and efficient test cases will usually be available. -- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month" Q: Why do mountain climbers rope themselves together? A: To prevent the sensible ones from going home. why do they insist on ading -Werror... Mesa would not compile out of the box if it were done by you guys ;) Uh, Mesa DOESN'T compile out of the box most of the time. All of a sudden, I want to THROW OVER my promising ACTING CAREER, grow a LONG BLACK BEARD and wear a BASEBALL HAT!! ... Although I don't know WHY!! If any man wishes to be humbled and mortified, let him become president of Harvard. -- Edward Holyoke Dr. Livingston? Dr. Livingston I. Presume? Ad astra per aspera. [To the stars by aspiration.] Kites rise highest against the wind -- not with it. -- Winston Churchill Clarke's Conclusion: Never let your sense of morals interfere with doing the right thing. "You are old," said the youth, "and your programs don't run, And there isn't one language you like; Yet of useful suggestions for help you have none -- Have you thought about taking a hike?" "Since I never write programs," his father replied, "Every language looks equally bad; Yet the people keep paying to read all my books And don't realize that they've been had." "Our journey toward the stars has progressed swiftly. In 1926 Robert H. Goddard launched the first liquid-propelled rocket, achieving an altitude of 41 feet. In 1962 John Glenn orbited the earth. In 1969, only 66 years after Orville Wright flew two feet off the ground for 12 seconds, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and I rocketed to the moon in Apollo 11." -- Michael Collins Former astronaut and past Director of the National Air and Space Museum A woman was in love with fourteen soldiers. It was clearly platoonic. The whole of life is futile unless you consider it as a sporting proposition. What is food to one, is to others bitter poison. -- Titus Lucretius Carus If women are supposed to be less rational and more emotional at the beginning of our menstrual cycle, when the female hormone is at its lowest level, then why isn't it logical to say that in those few days women behave the most like the way men behave all month long? -- Gloria Steinham Do not count your chickens before they are hatched. -- Aesop War is much too serious a matter to be entrusted to the military. -- Clemenceau Imitation is the sincerest form of television. -- Fred Allen > You know you are "there" when you are known by your first name, and > are recognized. > Lemmie see, there is Madonna, and Linus, and ..... help me out here! Bill ? ;-) -- From some postings on comp.os.linux.misc List was current at time of printing. Satire is what closes Saturday night. -- George Kaufman 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" "Few sins are less forgivable in polite society than offering poor people products they actively seek." -- Katherine Mangu-Ward, "Education for Profit", Reason Magazine, July 2008 It's odd, and a little unsettling, to reflect upon the fact that English is the only major language in which "I" is capitalized; in many other languages "You" is capitalized and the "i" is lower case. -- Sydney J. Harris I have a rock garden. Last week three of them died. -- Richard Diran A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in God. NOTICE: Anyone seen smoking will be assumed to be on fire and will be summarily put out. E Pluribus Unix You can't expect a boy to be vicious till he's been to a good school. -- H. H. Munro God is real, unless declared integer. Ginsberg's Theorem: (1) You can't win. (2) You can't break even. (3) You can't even quit the game. Freeman's Commentary on Ginsberg's theorem: Every major philosophy that attempts to make life seem meaningful is based on the negation of one part of Ginsberg's Theorem. To wit: (1) Capitalism is based on the assumption that you can win. (2) Socialism is based on the assumption that you can break even. (3) Mysticism is based on the assumption that you can quit the game. "Regardless of the legal speed limit, your Buick must be operated at speeds faster than 85 MPH (140kph)." -- 1987 Buick Grand National owners manual. Do not handicap your children by making their lives easy. -- Robert Heinlein The future isn't what it used to be. (It never was.) The better part of valor is discretion. -- William Shakespeare, "Henry IV" What I want is all of the power and none of the responsibility. A critic is a bundle of biases held loosely together by a sense of taste. -- Whitney Balliett Celebrity voices impersonated. A bird in the hand is worth what it will bring. Modern psychology takes completely for granted that behavior and neural function are perfectly correlated, that one is completely caused by the other. There is no separate soul or lifeforce to stick a finger into the brain now and then and make neural cells do what they would not otherwise. Actually, of course, this is a working assumption only....It is quite conceivable that someday the assumption will have to be rejected. But it is important also to see that we have not reached that day yet: the working assumption is a necessary one and there is no real evidence opposed to it. Our failure to solve a problem so far does not make it insoluble. One cannot logically be a determinist in physics and biology, and a mystic in psychology. -- D. O. Hebb, Organization of Behavior: A Neuropsychological Theory, 1949 LordHavoc: I'm already insane. damn straight. or curvy, crooked, or what have you All the simple programs have been written. Lots of folks are forced to skimp to support a government that won't. Any Member introducing or causing to be introduced a dog into the Society's premises shall be liable to a fine of £5 inflicted by the Treasurer. Any animal leading a blind person shall be deemed to be a cat. Any animal entering on Police business shall be deemed to be a wombat. -- Rule 51, Oxford Union Society A computer without COBOL and Fortran is like a piece of chocolate cake without ketchup and mustard. "Flattery is all right -- if you don't inhale." -- Adlai Stevenson "World domination. Fast" (By Linus Torvalds) I've already got a female to worry about. Her name is the Enterprise. -- Kirk, "The Corbomite Maneuver", stardate 1514.0 There is no character, howsoever good and fine, but it can be destroyed by ridicule, howsoever poor and witless. Observe the ass, for instance: his character is about perfect, he is the choicest spirit among all the humbler animals, yet see what ridicule has brought him to. Instead of feeling complimented when we are called an ass, we are left in doubt. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" The one sure way to make a lazy man look respectable is to put a fishing rod in his hand. "Our attitude with TCP/IP is, `Hey, we'll do it, but don't make a big system, because we can't fix it if it breaks -- nobody can.'" "TCP/IP is OK if you've got a little informal club, and it doesn't make any difference if it takes a while to fix it." -- Ken Olson, in Digital News, 1988 Wouldn't the sentence "I want to put a hyphen between the words Fish and And and And and Chips in my Fish-And-Chips sign" have been clearer if quotation marks had been placed before Fish, and between Fish and and, and and and And, and And and and, and and and And, and And and and, and and and Chips, as well as after Chips? 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 It used to be the fun was in The capture and kill. In another place and time I did it all for thrills. -- Lust to Love Fifty flippant frogs Walked by on flippered feet And with their slime they made the time Unnaturally fleet. DYSLEXICS OF THE WORLD, UNTIE! When a girl marries she exchanges the attentions of many men for the inattentions of one. -- Helen Rowland You can have a dog as a friend. You can have whiskey as a friend. But if you have a woman as a friend, you're going to wind up drunk and kissing your dog. -- foolin' around finlandia:~> apropos win win: nothing appropriate. Sinners can repent, but stupid is forever. If you think nobody cares if you're alive, try missing a couple of car payments. -- Earl Wilson The sooner you make your first 5000 mistakes, the sooner you will be able to correct them. -- Nicolaides Ambidextrous, adj.: Able to pick with equal skill a right-hand pocket or a left. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" Historic Overdosing: To live in a period of time when too much seems to happen. Major symptoms include addiction to newspapers, magazines, and TV news broadcasts. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" NOTICE: Anyone seen smoking will be assumed to be on fire and will be summarily put out. There is only one way to be happy by means of the heart -- to have none. -- Paul Bourget I expect that noone has objections. However, if I'd only add these entries to the list because `I think it's the right thing to do', I'd get a lot of flames afterwards :) -- Christian Schwarz Uncompensated overtime? Just Say No. `Just the place for a Snark!' the Bellman cried, As he landed his crew with care; Supporting each man on the top of the tide By a finger entwined in his hair. `Just the place for a Snark! I have said it twice: That alone should encourage the crew. Just the place for a Snark! I have said it thrice: What I tell you three times is true.' The difference between dogs and cats is that dogs come when they're called. Cats take a message and get back to you. Q: What's hard going in and soft and sticky coming out? A: Chewing gum. The cost of living is going up, and the chance of living is going down. Remember Darwin; building a better mousetrap merely results in smarter mice. I am, in point of fact, a particularly haughty and exclusive person, of pre-Adamite ancestral descent. You will understand this when I tell you that I can trace my ancestry back to a protoplasmal primordial atomic globule. Consequently, my family pride is something inconceivable. I can't help it. I was born sneering. -- Pooh-Bah, "The Mikado" Progress means replacing a theory that is wrong with one more subtly wrong. Dear Emily, what about test messages? -- Concerned Dear Concerned: It is important, when testing, to test the entire net. Never test merely a subnet distribution when the whole net can be done. Also put "please ignore" on your test messages, since we all know that everybody always skips a message with a line like that. Don't use a subject like "My sex is female but I demand to be addressed as male." because such articles are read in depth by all USEnauts. -- Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette Black Holes: An X generation subgroup best known for their possession of almost entirely black wardrobes. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" As I currently don't have a floppy drive in my computer, I'd like to make an `emergency cdrom' ;) -- Eugene Crosser The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed. -- Carl Jung Every young man should have a hobby: learning how to handle money is the best one. -- Jack Hurley I need to discuss BUY-BACK PROVISIONS with at least six studio SLEAZEBALLS!! When the blind lead the blind they will both fall over the cliff. -- Chinese proverb Different all twisty a of in maze are you, passages little. Hartley's First Law: You can lead a horse to water, but if you can get him to float on his back, you've got something. The entire CHINESE WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL TEAM all share ONE personality -- and have since BIRTH!! Reality -- what a concept! -- Robin Williams DE: The Soviets seem to have difficulty implementing modern technology. Would you comment on that? Belenko: Well, let's talk about aircraft engine lifetime. When I flew the MiG-25, its engines had a total lifetime of 250 hours. DE: Is that mean-time-between-failure? Belenko: No, the engine is finished; it is scrapped. DE: You mean they pull it out and throw it away, not even overhauling it? Belenko: That is correct. Overhaul is too expensive. DE: That is absurdly low by free world standards. Belenko: I know. -- an interview with Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976 "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 102 Civilization, as we know it, will end sometime this evening. See SYSNOTE tomorrow for more information. Avert misunderstanding by calm, poise, and balance. She was good at playing abstract confusion in the same way a midget is good at being short. -- Clive James, on Marilyn Monroe Will your long-winded speeches never end? What ails you that you keep on arguing? -- Job 16:3 Do you think that illiterate people get the full effect of alphabet soup? I think I'll KILL myself by leaping out of this 14th STORY WINDOW while reading ERICA JONG'S poetry!! The FIELD GUIDE to NORTH AMERICAN MALES SPECIES: Cranial Males SUBSPECIES: The Hacker (homo computatis) Description: Gangly and frail, the hacker has a high forehead and thinning hair. Head disproportionately large and crooked forward, complexion wan and sightly gray from CRT illumination. He has heavy black-rimmed glasses and a look of intense concentration, which may be due to a software problem or to a pork-and-bean breakfast. Feathering: HOMO COMPUTATIS saw a Brylcreem ad fifteen years ago and believed it. Consequently, crest is greased down, except for the cowlick. Song: A rather plaintive "Is it up?" The vigor of civilized societies is preserved by the widespread sense that high aims are worth-while. Vigorous societies harbor a certain extravagance of objectives, so that men wander beyond the safe provision of personal gratifications. All strong interests easily become impersonal, the love of a good job well done. There is a sense of harmony about such an accomplishment, the Peace brought by something worth-while. -- Alfred North Whitehead, 1963, in "The History of Manned Space Flight" We use Linux for all our mission-critical applications. Having the source code means that we are not held hostage by anyone's support department. -- Russell Nelson, President of Crynwr Software Baseball is a skilled game. It's America's game - it, and high taxes. -- The Best of Will Rogers Weiner's Law of Libraries: There are no answers, only cross references. Bachelor: A guy who is footloose and fiancee-free. Girls really do know just what they want -- you to figure it out for yourself! You look tired. Never leave anything to chance; make sure all your crimes are premeditated. Platonic Shadow: A nonsexual friendship with a member of the opposite sex. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Do not open shrink-wrap until you have read and agreed to the conditions contained within. How many NASA managers does it take to screw in a lightbulb? "That's a known problem... don't worry about it." Once, adv.: Enough. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" There was a phone call for you. A baby is God's opinion that the world should go on. -- Carl Sandburg Jesus is my POSTMASTER GENERAL ... >Ever heard of .cshrc? That's a city in Bosnia. Right? (Discussion in comp.os.linux.misc on the intuitiveness of commands.) The moon may be smaller than Earth, but it's further away. Someday you'll get your big chance -- or have you already had it? I used to think I was indecisive, but now I'm not so sure. 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. i dont even know if it makes sense at all :) This is an experimental patch for an experimental kernel :)) -- Ingo Molnar on linux-kernel In a great romance, each person basically plays a part that the other really likes. -- Elizabeth Ashley Love is the delusion that one woman differs from another. -- H. L. Mencken Often things ARE as bad as they seem! I used to think that the brain was the most wonderful organ in my body. Then I realized who was telling me this. -- Emo Phillips "Besides, I think [Slackware] sounds better than 'Microsoft,' don't you?" (By Patrick Volkerding) You can observe a lot just by watching. -- Yogi Berra "Insofar as I may be heard by anything, which may or may not care what I say, I ask, if it matters, that you be forgiven for anything you may have done or failed to do which requires forgiveness. Conversely, if not forgiveness but something else may be required to insure any possible benefit for which you may be eligible after the destruction of your body, I ask that this, whatever it may be, be granted or withheld, as the case may be, in such a manner as to insure your receiving said benefit. I ask this in my capacity as your elected intermediary between yourself and that which may not be yourself, but which may have an interest in the matter of your receiving as much as it is possible for you to receive of this thing, and which may in some way be influenced by this ceremony. Amen." Madrak, in _Creatures of Light and Darkness_, by Roger Zelazny The energy produced by the breaking down of the atom is a very poor kind of thing. Anyone who expects a source of power from the transformation of these atoms is talking moonshine. -- Ernest Rutherford, after he had split the atom for the first time High heels are a device invented by a woman who was tired of being kissed on the forehead. The courtroom was pregnant (pun intended) with anxious silence as the judge solemnly considered his verdict in the paternity suit before him. Suddenly, he reached into the folds of his robes, drew out a cigar and ceremoniously handed it to the defendant. "Congratulations!" declaimed the jurist. "You have just become a father!" "Regardless of the legal speed limit, your Buick must be operated at speeds faster than 85 MPH (140kph)." -- 1987 Buick Grand National owners manual. My love runs by like a day in June, And he makes no friends of sorrows. He'll tread his galloping rigadoon In the pathway or the morrows. He'll live his days where the sunbeams start Nor could storm or wind uproot him. My own dear love, he is all my heart -- And I wish somebody'd shoot him. -- Dorothy Parker, part 3 The USA is so enormous, and so numerous are its schools, colleges and religious seminaries, many devoted to special religious beliefs ranging from the unorthodox to the dotty, that we can hardly wonder at its yielding a more bounteous harvest of gobbledegook than the rest of the world put together. -- Sir Peter Medawar No directory. Keep grandma off the streets -- legalize bingo. An Irishman is never at peace except when he's fighting. When one burns one's bridges, what a very nice fire it makes. -- Dylan Thomas It has just been discovered that research causes cancer in rats. If I set here and stare at nothing long enough, people might think I'm an engineer working on something. -- S. R. McElroy The Commandments of the EE: (1) Beware of lightning that lurketh in an uncharged condenser lest it cause thee to bounce upon thy buttocks in a most embarrassing manner. (2) Cause thou the switch that supplieth large quantities of juice to be opened and thusly tagged, that thy days may be long in this earthly vale of tears. (3) Prove to thyself that all circuits that radiateth, and upon which the worketh, are grounded and thusly tagged lest they lift thee to a radio frequency potential and causeth thee to make like a radiator too. (4) Tarry thou not amongst these fools that engage in intentional shocks for they are not long for this world and are surely unbelievers. Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind. -- Wm. Shakespeare My favorite sandwich is peanut butter, baloney, cheddar cheese, lettuce and mayonnaise on toasted bread with catsup on the side. -- Senator Hubert Humphrey Like my parents, I have never been a regular church member or churchgoer. It doesn't seem plausible to me that there is the kind of God who watches over human affairs, listens to prayers, and tries to guide people to follow His precepts -- there is just too much misery and cruelty for that. On the other hand, I respect and envy the people who get inspiration from their religions. -- Benjamin Spock When you get your PH.D. will you get able to work at BURGER KING? This is Betty Frenel. I don't know who to call but I can't reach my Food-a-holics partner. I'm at Vido's on my second pizza with sausage and mushroom. Jim, come and get me! Q: What is printed on the bottom of beer bottles in Minnesota? A: Open other end. ...[Linux's] capacity to talk via any medium except smoke signals. -- Dr. Greg Wettstein, Roger Maris Cancer Center Loud burping while walking around the airport is prohibited in Halstead, Kansas. I. Any body suspended in space will remain in space until made aware of its situation. Daffy Duck steps off a cliff, expecting further pastureland. He loiters in midair, soliloquizing flippantly, until he chances to look down. At this point, the familiar principle of 32 feet per second per second takes over. II. Any body in motion will tend to remain in motion until solid matter intervenes suddenly. Whether shot from a cannon or in hot pursuit on foot, cartoon characters are so absolute in their momentum that only a telephone pole or an outsize boulder retards their forward motion absolutely. Sir Isaac Newton called this sudden termination of motion the stooge's surcease. III. Any body passing through solid matter will leave a perforation conforming to its perimeter. Also called the silhouette of passage, this phenomenon is the speciality of victims of directed-pressure explosions and of reckless cowards who are so eager to escape that they exit directly through the wall of a house, leaving a cookie-cutout-perfect hole. The threat of skunks or matrimony often catalyzes this reaction. -- Esquire, "O'Donnell's Laws of Cartoon Motion", June 1980 Perhaps they will have to outlaw sending random lists of words. fee fie foe foo [sic] -- Larry Wall in <199710311916.LAA19760@wall.org> If you can't understand it, it is intuitively obvious. Consensus Terrorism: The process that decides in-office attitudes and behavior. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Sometime in 1993 NANCY SINATRA will lead a BLOODLESS COUP on GUAM!! I want you to organize my PASTRY trays ... my TEA-TINS are gleaming in formation like a ROW of DRUM MAJORETTES -- please don't be FURIOUS with me -- WHENEVER ANYBODY SAYS he's struggling to become a human being I have to laugh because the apes beat him to it by about a million years. Struggle to become a parrot or something. -- Jack Handey, The New Mexican, 1988. You never go anywhere without your soul. There is no fool to the old fool. -- John Heywood Usage: fortune -P [-f] -a [xsz] Q: file [rKe9] -v6[+] file1 ... There is nothing wrong with writing ... as long as it is done in private and you wash your hands afterward. Shapes The Way has no true shape, And therefore none can control it. If a ruler could control the Way All things would follow In harmony with his desire, And sweet rain would fall, Effortlessly slaking every thirst. The Way is shaped by use, But then the shape is lost. Do not hold fast to shapes But let sensation flow into the world As a river courses down to the sea. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" Even though they raised the rate for first class mail in the United States we really shouldn't complain -- it's still only two cents a day. [and getting better! Soon it'll be down to a penny a day!] Various documentation updates and bugfixes (the best way to know that a stable kernel is approaching is to notice that somebody starts to spellcheck the kernel - it has so far never failed) -- Linus Torvalds in the annoucement for pre-2.1.99-3 Just go ahead and write your own multitasking multiuser os! Worked for me all the times. -- Linus Torvalds "I think that most debian developers are rather "strong willed" people with a great degree of understanding and a high level of passion for what they perceive as important in development of the debian system." -- Bill Leach Hartley's First Law: You can lead a horse to water, but if you can get him to float on his back, you've got something. Age and treachery will always overcome youth and skill. Advertising may be described as the science of arresting the human intelligence long enough to get money from it. Welcome to UNIX! Enjoy your session! Have a great time! Note the use of exclamation points! They are a very effective method for demonstrating excitement, and can also spice up an otherwise plain-looking sentence! However, there are drawbacks! Too much unnecessary exclaiming can lead to a reduction in the effect that an exclamation point has on the reader! For example, the sentence Jane went to the store to buy bread should only be ended with an exclamation point if there is something sensational about her going to the store, for example, if Jane is a cocker spaniel or if Jane is on a diet that doesn't allow bread or if Jane doesn't exist for some reason! See how easy it is?! Proper control of exclamation points can add new meaning to your life! Call now to receive my free pamphlet, "The Wonder and Mystery of the Exclamation Point!"! Enclose fifteen(!) dollars for postage and handling! Operators are standing by! (Which is pretty amazing, because they're all cocker spaniels!) Death is only a state of mind. Only it doesn't leave you much time to think about anything else. 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." 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_ Wit, n.: The salt with which the American Humorist spoils his cookery ... by leaving it out. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" "Hey Ivan, check your six." -- Sidewinder missile jacket patch, showing a Sidewinder driving up the tail of a Russian Su-27 c++: the power, elegance and simplicity of a hand grenade If you see an onion ring -- answer it! Q: What's the difference between USL and the Titanic? A: The Titanic had a band. Better by far you should forget and smile than that you should remember and be sad. -- Christina Rossetti The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as his Father, in the womb of a virgin will be classified with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter. But we may hope that the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in these United States will do away with this artificial scaffolding and restore to us the primitive and genuine doctrines of this most venerated Reformer of human errors. -- Thomas Jefferson Intolerance is the last defense of the insecure. If I had done everything I'm credited with, I'd be speaking to you from a laboratory jar at Harvard. -- Frank Sinatra AS USUAL, YOUR INFORMATION STINKS. -- Frank Sinatra, telegram to "Time" magazine Some men are so macho they'll get you pregnant just to kill a rabbit. -- Maureen Murphy I'd rather have a free bottle in front of me than a prefrontal lobotomy. -- Fred Allen [Also attributed to S. Clay Wilson. Ed.] The first thing I do in the morning is brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue. -- Dorothy Parker Please stand for the National Anthem: Oh, say can you see by dawn's early light What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming? Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming? And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there. Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave? Thank you. You may resume your seat. No friendship is so cordial or so delicious as that of girl for girl; no hatred so intense or immovable as that of woman for woman. -- Landor Either I'm dead or my watch has stopped. -- Groucho Marx's last words How do you explain Wayne Newton's POWER over millions? It's th' MOUSTACHE ... Have you ever noticed th' way it radiates SINCERITY, HONESTY & WARMTH? It's a MOUSTACHE you want to take HOME and introduce to NANCY SINATRA! The most costly of all follies is to believe passionately in the palpably not true. It is the chief occupation of mankind. -- H. L. Mencken "Note that if I can get you to \"su and say\" something just by asking, you have a very serious security problem on your system and you should look into it." (By Paul Vixie, vixie-cron 3.0.1 installation notes) Humor in the Court: Q: Now, you have investigated other murders, have you not, where there was a victim? Etiquette is for those with no breeding; fashion for those with no taste. A pain in the ass of major dimensions. -- C. A. Desoer, on the solution of non-linear circuits Proper treatment will cure a cold in seven days, but left to itself, a cold will hang on for a week. -- Darrell Huff Hey! Come merry dol! derry dol! My darling! Light goes the weather-wind and the feathered starling. Down along under Hill, shining in the sunlight, Waiting on the doorstep for the cold starlight, There my pretty lady is, River-woman's daughter, Slender as the willow-wand, clearer than the water. Old Tom Bombadil water-lilies bringing Comes hopping home again. Can you hear him singing? Hey! Come merry dol! derry dol! and merry-o Goldberry, Goldberry, merry yellow berry-o! Poor old Willow-man, you tuck your roots away! Tom's in a hurry now. Evening will follow day. Tom's going home again water-lilies bringing. Hey! come derry dol! Can you hear me singing? -- J. R. R. Tolkien "And it's my opinion, and that's only my opinion, you are a lunatic. Just because there are a few hunderd other people sharing your lunacy with you does not make you any saner. Doomed, eh?" -- Oleg Kiselev,oleg@CS.UCLA.EDU Winning isn't everything. It's the only thing. -- Vince Lombardi There are no accidents whatsoever in the universe. -- Baba Ram Dass To craunch a marmoset. -- Pedro Carolino, "English as She is Spoke" When you're a Yup You're a Yup all the way From your first slice of Brie To your last Cabernet. When you're a Yup You're not just a dreamer You're making things happen You're driving a Beamer. How many priests are needed for a Boston Mass? I've touch'd the highest point of all my greatness; And from that full meridian of my glory I haste now to my setting. I shall fall, Like a bright exhalation in the evening And no man see me more. -- Shakespeare I do not know myself and God forbid that I should. -- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe I lately lost a preposition; It hid, I thought, beneath my chair And angrily I cried, "Perdition! Up from out of under there." Correctness is my vade mecum, And straggling phrases I abhor, And yet I wondered, "What should he come Up from out of under for?" -- Morris Bishop If you are shooting under 80 you are neglecting your business; over 80 you are neglecting your golf. -- Walter Hagen This product is meant for educational purposes only. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental. Void where prohibited. Some assembly may be required. Batteries not included. Contents may settle during shipment. Use only as directed. May be too intense for some viewers. If condition persists, consult your physician. No user-serviceable parts inside. Breaking seal constitutes acceptance of agreement. Not responsible for direct, indirect, incidental or consequential damages resulting from any defect, error or failure to perform. Slippery when wet. For office use only. Substantial penalty for early withdrawal. Do not write below this line. Your cancelled check is your receipt. Avoid contact with skin. Employees and their families are not eligible. Beware of dog. Driver does not carry cash. Limited time offer, call now to insure prompt delivery. Use only in well-ventilated area. Keep away from fire or flame. Some equipment shown is optional. Price does not include taxes, dealer prep, or delivery. Penalty for private use. Call toll free before digging. Some of the trademarks mentioned in this product appear for identification purposes only. All models over 18 years of age. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Postage will be paid by addressee. Apply only to affected area. One size fits all. Many suitcases look alike. Edited for television. No solicitors. Reproduction strictly prohibited. Restaurant package, not for resale. Objects in mirror are closer than they appear. Decision of judges is final. This supersedes all previous notices. No other warranty expressed or implied. "We all know Linux is great...it does infinite loops in 5 seconds." (Linus Torvalds about the superiority of Linux on the Amsterdam Linux Symposium) Not for human consumption. Black shiny mollies and bright colored guppies, Shy little angels as gentle as puppies, Swimming and diving with scarcely a swish, They were just some of my tropical fish. Then I got mantas that sting in the water, Deadly piranhas that itch for a slaughter, Savage male betas that bite with a squish, Now I have many less tropical fish. If you think that Fish are peaceful That's an empty wish. Just dump them together And leave them alone, And soon you will have -- no fish. -- To My Favorite Things By working faithfully eight hours a day, you may eventually get to be boss and work twelve. -- Robert Frost They don't know how the world is shaped. And so they give it a shape, and try to make everything fit it. They separate the right from the left, the man from the woman, the plant from the animal, the sun from the moon. They only want to count to two. -- Emma Bull, "Bone Dance" Worst Month of 1981 for Downhill Skiing: August. The lift lines are the shortest, though. -- Steve Rubenstein To be trusted is a greater compliment than to be loved. If there was any justice in the world, "trust" would be a four-letter word. God is real, unless declared integer. My mother is a fish. -- William Faulkner I was about to say, "Avoid fame like the plague," but you know, they can cure the plague with penicillin these days. -- Larry Wall in <199709242015.NAA10312@wall.org> And I heard Jeff exclaim, As they strolled out of sight, "Merry Christmas to all -- You take credit cards, right?" -- "Outsiders" comic The light at the end of the tunnel is the headlight of an approaching train. Change your thoughts and you change your world. Cheap things are of no value, valuable things are not cheap. I'm encased in the lining of a pure pork sausage!! It is when I struggle to be brief that I become obscure. -- Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Horace) you people are all insane. knight: sure, that's why we work on Debian. Knghtbrd: get in touch with your inner nutcase. Real wealth can only increase. -- R. Buckminster Fuller We're fantastically incredibly sorry for all these extremely unreasonable things we did. I can only plead that my simple, barely-sentient friend and myself are underprivileged, deprived and also college students. -- Waldo D. R. Dobbs A lady is one who never shows her underwear unintentionally. -- Lillian Day He who hates vices hates mankind. The computer industry is journalists in their 20's standing in awe of entrepreneurs in their 30's who are hiring salesmen in their 40's and 50's and paying them in the 60's and 70's to bring their marketing into the 80's. -- Marty Winston "Well I don't see why I have to make one man miserable when I can make so many men happy." -- Ellyn Mustard, about marriage Practice is the best of all instructors. -- Publilius Cropp's Law: The amount of work done varies inversly with the time spent in the office. On Netscape GPLing their browser: ``How can you trust a browser that ANYONE can hack? For the secure choice, choose Microsoft.'' -- in a comment on slashdot.org The black bear used to be one of the most commonly seen large animals because in Yosemite and Sequoia national parks they lived off of garbage and tourist handouts. This bear has learned to open car doors in Yosemite, where damage to automobiles caused by bears runs into the tens of thousands of dollars a year. Campaigns to bearproof all garbage containers in wild areas have been difficult, because as one biologist put it, "There is a considerable overlap between the intelligence levels of the smartest bears and the dumbest tourists." "Pardon me for breathing, which I never do anyway so I don't know why I bother to say it, oh God, I'm so depressed. Here's another of those self-satisfied doors. Life! Don't talk to me about life." -- Marvin the Paranoid Android A sharper perspective on this matter is particularly important to feminist thought today, because a major tendency in feminism has constructed the problem of domination as a drama of female vulnerability victimized by male aggression. Even the more sophisticated feminist thinkers frequently shy away from the analysis of submission, for fear that in admitting woman's participation in the relationship of domination, the onus of responsibility will appear to shift from men to women, and the moral victory from women to men. More generally, this has been a weakness of radical politics: to idealize the oppressed, as if their politics and culture were untouched by the system of domination, as if people did not participate in their own submission. To reduce domination to a simple relation of doer and done-to is to substitute moral outrage for analysis. -- Jessica Benjamin, "The Bonds of Love" Beware of Bigfoot! 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. Of all the words of witch's doom There's none so bad as which and whom. The man who kills both which and whom Will be enshrined in our Who's Whom. -- Fletcher Knebel "Contrariwise," continued Tweedledee, "if it was so, it might be, and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic!" -- Lewis Carroll, "Through the Looking Glass" Knowledge, sir, should be free to all! -- Harry Mudd, "I, Mudd", stardate 4513.3 Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind. -- Wm. Shakespeare Don't everyone thank me at once! -- Han Solo The savior becomes the victim. <|Rain|> I *love* SWB!! <|Rain|> Or, press 5 to speak to a representitive.. <|Rain|> *5* <|Rain|> You are being transferred, please hold... <|Rain|> ... <|Rain|> ... <|Rain|> We're sorry, this number can not be completed as dialed. <|Rain|> Please check the number and try again. Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside a dog it's too dark to read. -- Groucho Marx If only you knew she loved you, you could face the uncertainty of whether you love her. Never leave anything to chance; make sure all your crimes are premeditated. Vila: "I think I have just made the biggest mistake of my life." Orac: "It is unlikely. I would predict there are far greater mistakes waiting to be made by someone with your obvious talent for it." But what can you do with it? -- ubiquitous cry from Linux-user partner We are MicroSoft. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. -- Attributed to B.G., Gill Bates Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot. By Order of the Author -- Mark Twain, "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" If you think the system is working, ask someone who's waiting for a prompt. Larkinson's Law: All laws are basically false. "With molasses you catch flies, with vinegar you catch nobody." -- Baltimore City Councilman Dominic DiPietro ... before I could come to any conclusion it occurred to me that my speech or my silence, indeed any action of mine, would be a mere futility. What did it matter what anyone knew or ignored? What did it matter who was manager? One gets sometimes such a flash of insight. The essentials of this affair lay deep under the surface, beyond my reach, and beyond my power of meddling. -- Joseph Conrad It seems a little silly now, but this country was founded as a protest against taxation. An elephant is a mouse with an operating system. Adhere to your own act, and congratulate yourself if you have done something strange and extravagant, and broken the monotony of a decorous age. -- Ralph Waldo Emerson Beauty: What's in your eye when you have a bee in your hand. Fellow programmer, greetings! You are reading a letter which will bring you luck and good fortune. Just mail (or UUCP) ten copies of this letter to ten of your friends. Before you make the copies, send a chip or other bit of hardware, and 100 lines of 'C' code to the first person on the list given at the bottom of this letter. Then delete their name and add yours to the bottom of the list. Don't break the chain! Make the copy within 48 hours. Gerald R. of San Diego failed to send out his ten copies and woke the next morning to find his job description changed to "COBOL programmer." Fred A. of New York sent out his ten copies and within a month had enough hardware and software to build a Cray dedicated to playing Zork. Martha H. of Chicago laughed at this letter and broke the chain. Shortly thereafter, a fire broke out in her terminal and she now spends her days writing documentation for IBM PC's. Don't break the chain! Send out your ten copies today! The person who's taking you to lunch has no intention of paying. Etymology, n.: Some early etymological scholars came up with derivations that were hard for the public to believe. The term "etymology" was formed from the Latin "etus" ("eaten"), the root "mal" ("bad"), and "logy" ("study of"). It meant "the study of things that are hard to swallow." -- Mike Kellen Almost anything derogatory you could say about today's software design would be accurate. -- K. E. Iverson Yes, but will I see the EASTER BUNNY in skintight leather at an IRON MAIDEN concert? Think of it! With VLSI we can pack 100 ENIACs in 1 sq. cm.! << WAIT >> I have not yet begun to byte! Harp not on that string. -- William Shakespeare, "Henry VI" It seemed the world was divided into good and bad people. The good ones slept better... while the bad ones seemed to enjoy the waking hours much more. -- Woody Allen, "Side Effects" Mercury, isn't debugging X a little like finding perfectly bugfree code in windows ?? WildCode: Debugging X is like trying to run a straight line through a maze. You just need to bend space-time so that the corners move around you and you won't have any problems. (=:] When there is an old maid in the house, a watch dog is unnecessary. -- Balzac AIX - the Unix from the universe where Spock has a beard. "These are DARK TIMES for all mankind's HIGHEST VALUES!" "These are DARK TIMES for FREEDOM and PROSPERITY!" "These are GREAT TIMES to put your money on BAD GUY to kick the CRAP out of MEGATON MAN!" Our policy is, when in doubt, do the right thing. -- Roy L. Ash, ex-president, Litton Industries Q: What do you get when you cross a mobster with an international standard? A: You get someone who makes you an offer that you can't understand! Your temporary financial embarrassment will be relieved in a surprising manner. Memories of you remind me of you. -- Karl Lehenbauer "It's classic percolate-up economics, recognizing that money is like manure: It works best if you spread it around." Intention: Carter's correlation: People with lots of either usually smell funny Knghtbrd: You SO win. "Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature... Life is either a daring adventure or nothing." -- Helen Keller "Lead us in a few words of silent prayer." -- Bill Peterson, former Houston Oiler football coach The way of the world is to praise dead saints and prosecute live ones. -- Nathaniel Howe Speer's 1st Law of Proofreading: The visibility of an error is inversely proportional to the number of times you have looked at it. Don't take life so serious, son, it ain't nohow permanent. -- Walt Kelly Diplomacy is to do and say, the nastiest thing in the nicest way. -- Balfour Keep up the good work! But please don't ask me to help. /* Halley */ (Halley's comment.) If swimming is so good for your figure, how come whales look the way they do? Forms follow function, and often obliterate it. "Once he had one leg in the White House and the nation trembled under his roars. Now he is a tinpot pope in the Coca-Cola belt and a brother to the forlorn pastors who belabor halfwits in galvanized iron tabernacles behind the railroad yards." - H. L. Mencken, writing of William Jennings Bryan, counsel for the supporters of Tennessee's anti-evolution law at the Scopes "Monkey Trial" in 1925. Water, taken in moderation cannot hurt anybody. -- Mark Twain Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it. The state of innocence contains the germs of all future sin. -- Alexandre Arnoux, "Etudes et caprices" Actresses will happen in the best regulated families. -- Addison Mizner and Oliver Herford, "The Entirely New Cynic's Calendar", 1905 If the meanings of "true" and "false" were switched, then this sentence would not be false. All theoretical chemistry is really physics; and all theoretical chemists know it. -- Richard P. Feynman What we anticipate seldom occurs; what we least expect generally happens. -- Bengamin Disraeli A man gazing at the stars is proverbially at the mercy of the puddles in the road. -- Alexander Smith "We don't have to protect the environment -- the Second Coming is at hand." -- James Watt The optimist thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. The pessimist is afraid this might be true. -- crazyphilman's sig on kuro5hin No matter how cynical you get, it's impossible to keep up. If man is only a little lower than the angels, the angels should reform. -- Mary Wilson Little Everything you know is wrong! What the hell is it good for? -- Robert Lloyd (engineer of the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM), to colleagues who insisted that the microprocessor was the wave of the future, c. 1968 David Letterman's "Things we can be proud of as Americans": * Greatest number of citizens who have actually boarded a UFO * Many newspapers feature "JUMBLE" * Hourly motel rates * Vast majority of Elvis movies made here * Didn't just give up right away during World War II like some countries we could mention * Goatees & Van Dykes thought to be worn only by weenies * Our well-behaved golf professionals * Fabulous babes coast to coast I never forget a face, but in your case I'll make an exception. -- Groucho Marx The Least Successful Equal Pay Advertisement In 1976 the European Economic Community pointed out to the Irish Government that it had not yet implemented the agreed sex equality legislation. The Dublin Government immediately advertised for an equal pay enforcement officer. The advertisement offered different salary scales for men and women. -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures" Celestial navigation is based on the premise that the Earth is the center of the universe. The premise is wrong, but the navigation works. An incorrect model can be a useful tool. -- Kelvin Throop III PURGE COMPLETE. The secret of happiness is total disregard of everybody. I'm a soldier, not a diplomat. I can only tell the truth. -- Kirk, "Errand of Mercy", stardate 3198.9 "Even nowadays a man can't step up and kill a woman without feeling just a bit unchivalrous ..." -- Robert Benchley There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hands. Software is like sex, it's better when it's free. -- Linus Torvalds FUN is never having to say you're SUSHI!! All the evidence concerning the universe has not yet been collected, so there's still hope. You have to admit that it's difficult to misplace the Perl sources. :-) -- Larry Wall in <1992Aug26.184221.29627@netlabs.com> I was eatin' some chop suey, With a lady in St. Louie, When there sudden comes a knockin' at the door. And that knocker, he says, "Honey, Roll this rocker out some money, Or your daddy shoots a baddie to the floor." -- Mr. Miggle If the government doesn't trust the people, why doesn't it dissolve them and elect a new people? Joey: I'm on it right now.. 3 1.3Gb disks, 128M ram, dual 50Mhz (Up to quad 250Mhz) The catch is that it pulls 110v at about 12A 8> 12A! Okay, my stove is 3000W, this sun is 1320W DO YOU SEE A PROBLEM HERE a 1320W sun, that is like a hair dryer :) To get back on your feet, miss two car payments. It is better to be bow-legged than no-legged. "An entire fraternity of strapping Wall-Street-bound youth. Hell - this is going to be a blood bath!" -- Post Bros. Comics Sex is like air. It's only a big deal if you can't get any. Ever get the feeling that the world's on tape and one of the reels is missing? -- Rich Little Falling in love is a lot like dying. You never get to do it enough to become good at it. FORTRAN is the language of Powerful Computers. -- Steven Feiner We cannot do everything at once, but we can do something at once. -- Calvin Coolidge The UNIX philosophy basically involves giving you enough rope to hang yourself. And then a couple of feet more, just to be sure. Bore, n.: A guy who wraps up a two-minute idea in a two-hour vocabulary. -- Walter Winchell Men ought to know that from the brain and from the brain only arise our pleasures, joys, laughter, and jests as well as our sorrows, pains, griefs and tears. ... It is the same thing which makes us mad or delirious, inspires us with dread and fear, whether by night or by day, brings us sleeplessness, inopportune mistakes, aimless anxieties, absent-mindedness and acts that are contrary to habit... -- Hippocrates (c. 460-c. 377 B.C.), The Sacred Disease Madison's Inquiry: If you have to travel on the Titanic, why not go first class? Tiger got to hunt, Bird got to fly; Man got to sit and wonder, "Why, why, why?" Tiger got to sleep, Bird got to land; Man got to tell himself he understand. -- The Books of Bokonon Fraud is the homage that force pays to reason. -- Charles Curtis, "A Commonplace Book" N: Phil Lewis E: beans@bucket.ualr.edu D: Promised to send money if I would put his name in the source tree. S: PO Box 371 S: North Little Rock, Arkansas 72115 S: US -- /usr/src/linux/CREDITS A stitch in time saves nine. Hanson's Treatment of Time: There are never enough hours in a day, but always too many days before Saturday. If it ain't baroque, don't phiques it. A young honeymoon couple were touring southern Florida and happened to stop at one of the rattlesnake farms along the road. After seeing the sights, they engaged in small talk with the man that handled the snakes. "Gosh!" exclaimed the new bride. "You certainly have a dangerous job. Don't you ever get bitten by the snakes?" "Yes, upon rare occasions," answered the handler. "Well," she continued, "just what do you do when you're bitten by a snake?" "I always carry a razor-sharp knife in my pocket, and as soon as I am bitten, I make deep criss-cross marks across the fang entry and then suck the poison from the wound." "What, uh... what would happen if you were to accidentally *sit* on a rattler?" persisted the woman. "Ma'am," answered the snake handler, "that will be the day I learn who my real friends are." Them as has, gets. Never leave anything to chance; make sure all your crimes are premeditated. Worst Vegetable of the Year: The brussels sprout. This is also the worst vegetable of next year. -- Steve Rubenstein And yet I should have dearly liked, I own, to have touched her lips; to have questioned her, that she might have opened them; to have looked upon the lashes of her downcast eyes, and never raised a blush; to have let loose waves of hair, an inch of which would be a keepsake beyond price: in short, I should have liked, I do confess, to have had the lightest license of a child, and yet been man enough to know its value. -- Charles Dickens I dunno, I dream in Perl sometimes... -- Larry Wall in <8538@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> After the game the king and the pawn go in the same box. -- Italian proverb Proboscis: The rudimentary organ of an elephant which serves him in place of the knife-and-fork that Evolution has as yet denied him. For purposes of humor it is popularly called a trunk. -- Ambrose Bierce "The only way I can lose this election is if I'm caught in bed with a dead girl or a live boy." -- Louisiana governor Edwin Edwards Death is God's way of telling you not to be such a wise guy. I didn't do it! Nobody saw me do it! Can't prove anything! -- Bart Simpson It is better to have loved and lost than just to have lost. Ask not for whom the Bell tolls, and you will pay only the station-to-station rate. -- Howard Kandel People's Action Rules: (1) Some people who can, shouldn't. (2) Some people who should, won't. (3) Some people who shouldn't, will. (4) Some people who can't, will try, regardless. (5) Some people who shouldn't, but try, will then blame others. Weiler's Law: Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it himself. "If you are beginning to doubt what I am saying, you are probably hallucinating." -- The Firesign Theatre, _Everything you know is Wrong_ The only winner in the War of 1812 was Tchaikovsky. -- David Gerrold Humor in the Court: Q. Did you ever stay all night with this man in New York? A. I refuse to answer that question. Q. Did you ever stay all night with this man in Chicago? A. I refuse to answer that question. Q. Did you ever stay all night with this man in Miami? A. No. There's a couple of million dollars worth of baseball talent on the loose, ready for the big leagues, yet unsigned by any major league. There are pitchers who would win 20 games a season ... and outfielders [who] could hit .350, infielders who could win recognition as stars, and there's at least one catcher who at this writing is probably superior to Bill Dickey, Josh Gibson. Only one thing is keeping them out of the big leagues, the pigmentation of their skin. They happen to be colored. -- Shirley Povich, 1941 The chains of marriage are so heavy that it takes two to carry them, and sometimes three. -- Alexandre Dumas Are you a parent? Do you sometimes find yourself unsure as to what to say in those awkward situations? Worry no more... When are you going to grow up? I'm only doing this for your own good. Why are you crying? Stop crying, or I'll give you something to cry about. What's wrong with you? Someday you'll thank me for this. You'd lose your head if it weren't attached. Don't you have any sense at all? If you keep sucking your thumb, it'll fall off. Why? Because I said so. I hope you have a kid just like yourself. Suffering alone exists, none who suffer; The deed there is, but no doer thereof; Nirvana is, but no one is seeking it; The Path there is, but none who travel it. -- "Buddhist Symbolism", Symbols and Values To err is human -- but it feels divine. -- Mae West Morton's Law: If rats are experimented upon, they will develop cancer. The farther you go, the less you know. -- Lao Tsu, "Tao Te Ching" If you can't say anything good about someone, sit right here by me. -- Alice Roosevelt Longworth "Pok pok pok, P'kok!" -- Superchicken A synonym is a word you use when you can't spell the word you first thought of. -- Burt Bacharach Canada Post doesn't really charge 32 cents for a stamp. It's 2 cents for postage and 30 cents for storage. -- Gerald Regan, Cabinet Minister, 12/31/83 Financial Post Personally, I like to defiantly split my infinitives. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199708271551.IAA10211@wall.org> Alimony is like buying oats for a dead horse. -- Arthur Baer Troubles are like babies; they only grow by nursing. Overconfidence breeds error when we take for granted that the game will continue on its normal course; when we fail to provide for an unusually powerful resource -- a check, a sacrifice, a stalemate. Afterwards the victim may wail, `But who could have dreamt of such an idiotic-looking move?' -- Fred Reinfeld, "The Complete Chess Course" Getting the job done is no excuse for not following the rules. Corollary: Following the rules will not get the job done. Conscience is a mother-in-law whose visit never ends. -- H. L. Mencken Adult, n.: One old enough to know better. Never tell a lie unless it is absolutely convenient. As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport. -- Shakespeare, "King Lear" The net of law is spread so wide, No sinner from its sweep may hide. Its meshes are so fine and strong, They take in every child of wrong. O wondrous web of mystery! Big fish alone escape from thee! -- James Jeffrey Roche I had another dream the other day about music critics. They were small and rodent-like with padlocked ears, as if they had stepped out of a painting by Goya. -- Stravinsky QOTD: "What women and psychologists call `dropping your armor', we call "baring your neck." 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 How long a minute is depends on which side of the bathroom door you're on. A would-be disciple came to Nasrudin's hut on the mountain-side. Knowing that every action of such an enlightened one is significant, the seeker watched the teacher closely. "Why do you blow on your hands?" "To warm myself in the cold." Later, Nasrudin poured bowls of hot soup for himself and the newcomer, and blew on his own. "Why are you doing that, Master?" "To cool the soup." Unable to trust a man who uses the same process to arrive at two different results -- hot and cold -- the disciple departed. Lemme make sure I'm not wasting time here... bcwhite will remove pkgs that havent been fixed that have outstanding bugs of severity "important". True or false? jim: "important" or higher. True. Then we're about to lose ftp.debian.org and dpkg :) * netgod will miss dpkg -- it was occasionally useful We still have rpm.... Men will always be men -- no matter where they are. -- Harry Mudd, "Mudd's Women", stardate 1329.8 Black shiny mollies and bright colored guppies, Shy little angels as gentle as puppies, Swimming and diving with scarcely a swish, They were just some of my tropical fish. Then I got mantas that sting in the water, Deadly piranhas that itch for a slaughter, Savage male betas that bite with a squish, Now I have many less tropical fish. If you think that Fish are peaceful That's an empty wish. Just dump them together And leave them alone, And soon you will have -- no fish. -- To My Favorite Things The Man Who Almost Invented The Vacuum Cleaner The man officially credited with inventing the vacuum cleaner is Hubert Cecil Booth. However, he got the idea from a man who almost invented it. In 1901 Booth visited a London music-hall. On the bill was an American inventor with his wonder machine for removing dust from carpets. The machine comprised a box about one foot square with a bag on top. After watching the act -- which made everyone in the front six rows sneeze -- Booth went round to the inventor's dressing room. "It should suck not blow," said Booth, coming straight to the point. "Suck?", exclaimed the enraged inventor. "Your machine just moves the dust around the room," Booth informed him. "Suck? Suck? Sucking is not possible," was the inventor's reply and he stormed out. Booth proved that it was by the simple expedient of kneeling down, pursing his lips and sucking the back of an armchair. "I almost choked," he said afterwards. -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures" Vulcans believe peace should not depend on force. -- Amanda, "Journey to Babel", stardate 3842.3 Jim, it's Grace at the bank. I checked your Christmas Club account. You don't have five-hundred dollars. You have fifty. Sorry, computer foul-up! -- "The Rockford Files" The telephone is a good way to talk to people without having to offer them a drink. -- Fran Lebowitz, "Interview" Death is nature's way of telling you to slow down. The trouble with telling a good story is that it invariably reminds the other fellow of a dull one. -- Sid Caesar The English instinctively admire any man who has no talent and is modest about it. -- James Agate, British film and drama critic Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault. 0x40095fb0 in memchr () from /lib/libc.so.6 (gdb) bt #0 0x40095fb0 in memchr () from /lib/libc.so.6 #1 0x0 in ?? () Well That's Really Helpful * knghtbrd trades gdb for a nice ouija board - it'll help more Your wig steers the gig. -- Lord Buckley Penguin Trivia #46: Animals who are not penguins can only wish they were. -- Chicago Reader 10/15/82 VMS, n.: The world's foremost multi-user adventure game. If a person (a) is poorly, (b) receives treatment intended to make him better, and (c) gets better, then no power of reasoning known to medical science can convince him that it may not have been the treatment that restored his health. -- Sir Peter Medawar, "The Art of the Soluble" 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" All this time I've been VIEWING a RUSSIAN MIDGET SODOMIZE a HOUSECAT! To a Californian, a person must prove himself criminally insane before he is allowed to drive a taxi in New York. For New York cabbies, honesty and stopping at red lights are both optional. -- From "East vs. West: The War Between the Coasts Concentrate on th'cute, li'l CARTOON GUYS! Remember the SERIAL NUMBERS!! Follow the WHIPPLE AVE. EXIT!! Have a FREE PEPSI!! Turn LEFT at th'HOLIDAY INN!! JOIN the CREDIT WORLD!! MAKE me an OFFER!!! No sooner had Edger Allen Poe Finished his old Raven, then he started his Old Crow. The appreciation of the average visual graphisticator alone is worth the whole suaveness and decadence which abounds!! I selected E5 ... but I didn't hear "Sam the Sham and the Pharoahs"! Bounders get bound when they are caught bounding. -- Ralph Lewin You're dead, Jim. -- McCoy, "The Tholian Web", stardate unknown Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proven innocent. -- George Orwell "But don't you see, the color of wine in a crystal glass can be spiritual. The look in a face, the music of a violin. A Paris theater can be infused with the spiritual for all its solidity." -- Lestat, _The Vampire Lestat_, Anne Rice Okay, Okay -- I admit it. You didn't change that program that worked just a little while ago; I inserted some random characters into the executable. Please forgive me. You can recover the file by typing in the code over again, since I also removed the source. Blinding speed can compensate for a lot of deficiencies. -- David Nichols Fortune's Real-Life Courtroom Quote #29: THE JUDGE: Now, as we begin, I must ask you to banish all present information and prejudice from your minds, if you have any ... Fortune's Guide to Freshman Notetaking: WHEN THE PROFESSOR SAYS: YOU WRITE: Probably the greatest quality of the poetry John Milton -- born 1608 of John Milton, who was born in 1608, is the combination of beauty and power. Few have excelled him in the use of the English language, or for that matter, in lucidity of verse form, 'Paradise Lost' being said to be the greatest single poem ever written." Current historians have come to Most of the problems that now doubt the complete advantageousness face the United States are of some of Roosevelt's policies... directly traceable to the bungling and greed of President Roosevelt. ... it is possible that we simply do Professor Mitchell is a not understand the Russian viewpoint... communist. 'Scuse me, while I kiss the sky! -- Robert James Marshall (Jimi) Hendrix If you want to be ruined, marry a rich woman. -- Michelet HELLO KITTY gang terrorizes town, family STICKERED to death! A poet who reads his verse in public may have other nasty habits. A scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it. -- Max Planck Any coward can sit in his home and criticize a pilot for flying into a mountain in a fog. But I would rather, by far, die on a mountainside than in bed. What kind of man would live where there is no daring? And is life so dear that we should blame men for dying in adventure? Is there a better way to die? -- Charles Lindbergh Hailing frequencies open, Captain. What publishers are looking for these days isn't radical feminism. It's corporate feminism -- a brand of feminism designed to sell books and magazines, three-piece suits, airline tickets, Scotch, cigarettes and, most important, corporate America's message, which runs: Yes, women were discriminated against in the past, but that unfortunate mistake has been remedied; now every woman can attain wealth, prestige and power by dint of individual rather than collective effort. -- Susan Gordon "Consequences, Schmonsequences, as long as I'm rich." -- Looney Tunes, Ali Baba Bunny (1957, Chuck Jones) Nature is by and large to be found out of doors, a location where, it cannot be argued, there are never enough comfortable chairs. -- Fran Lebowitz You fill a much-needed gap. If I don't see you in the future, I'll see you in the pasture. MAC user's dynamic debugging list evaluator? Never heard of that. PLUG IT IN!!! Whether your covers star a male or a female, I read your magazine for the articles -- Leo Costales, in "Outside July 2005" Instead of giving money to found colleges to promote learning, why don't they pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting anybody from learning anything? If it works as good as the Prohibition one did, why, in five years we would have the smartest race of people on earth. -- The Best of Will Rogers I always pass on good advice. It is the only thing to do with it. It is never any good to oneself. -- Oscar Wilde, "An Ideal Husband" By protracting life, we do not deduct one jot from the duration of death. -- Titus Lucretius Carus His heart was yours from the first moment that you met. You k'n hide de fier, but w'at you gwine do wid de smoke? -- Joel Chandler Harris, proverbs of Uncle Remus Life does not begin at the moment of conception or the moment of birth. It begins when the kids leave home and the dog dies. QOTD: "Every morning I read the obituaries; if my name's not there, I go to work." I never liked you, and I always will. -Samuel Goldwyn TV is chewing gum for the eyes. -- Frank Lloyd Wright I use technology in order to hate it more properly. -- Nam June Paik We're only in it for the volume. -- Black Sabbath Simon's Law: Everything put together falls apart sooner or later. "The greatest warriors are the ones who fight for peace." -- Holly Near 1 + 1 = 3, for large values of 1. Software entities are more complex for their size than perhaps any other human construct because no two parts are alike. If they are, we make the two similar parts into a subroutine -- open or closed. In this respect, software systems differ profoundly from computers, buildings, or automobiles, where repeated elements abound. -- Fred Brooks, Jr. You can take all the impact that science considerations have on funding decisions at NASA, put them in the navel of a flea, and have room left over for a caraway seed and Tony Calio's heart. -- F. Allen I like the way ONLY their mouths move ... They look like DYING OYSTERS Authors are easy to get on with -- if you're fond of children. -- Michael Joseph, "Observer" For three years, the young attorney had been taking his brief vacations at this country inn. The last time he'd finally managed an affair with the innkeeper's daughter. Looking forward to an exciting few days, he dragged his suitcase up the stairs of the inn, then stopped short. There sat his lover with an infant on her lap! "Helen, why didn't you write when you learned you were pregnant?" he cried. "I would have rushed up here, we could have gotten married, and the baby would have my name!" "Well," she said, "when my folks found out about my condition, we sat up all night talkin' and talkin' and finally decided it would be better to have a bastard in the family than a lawyer." While it may be true that a watched pot never boils, the one you don't keep an eye on can make an awful mess of your stove. -- Edward Stevenson The Gurus of Unix Meeting of Minds (GUMM) takes place Wednesday, April 1, 2076 (check THAT in your perpetual calendar program), 14 feet above the ground directly in front of the Milpitas Gumps. Members will grep each other by the hand (after intro), yacc a lot, smoke filtered chroots in pipes, chown with forks, use the wc (unless uuclean), fseek nice zombie processes, strip, and sleep, but not, we hope, od. Three days will be devoted to discussion of the ramifications of whodo. Two seconds have been allotted for a complete rundown of all the user- friendly features of Unix. Seminars include "Everything You Know is Wrong", led by Tom Kempson, "Batman or Cat:man?" led by Richie Dennis "cc C? Si! Si!" led by Kerwin Bernighan, and "Document Unix, Are You Kidding?" led by Jan Yeats. No Reader Service No. is necessary because all GUGUs (Gurus of Unix Group of Users) already know everything we could tell them. -- "Get GUMMed," Dr. Dobb's Journal, June '84 Poorochrondria: Hypochrondria derived from not having medical insurance. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" I tell ya, I was an ugly kid. I was so ugly that my dad kept the kid's picture that came with the wallet he bought. -- Rodney Dangerfield Save a little money each month and at the end of the year you'll be surprised at how little you have. -- Ernest Haskins Anything anybody can say about America is true. -- Emmett Grogan Evolution is as much a fact as the earth turning on its axis and going around the sun. At one time this was called the Copernican theory; but, when evidence for a theory becomes so overwhelming that no informed person can doubt it, it is customary for scientists to call it a fact. That all present life descended from earlier forms, over vast stretches of geologic time, is as firmly established as Copernican cosmology. Biologists differ only with respect to theories about how the process operates. - Martin Gardner, "Irving Kristol and the Facts of Life", The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 128-131 "A mind is a terrible thing to have leaking out your ears." -- The League of Sadistic Telepaths A-Z affectionately, 1 to 10 alphabetically, from here to eternity without in betweens, still looking for a custom fit in an off-the-rack world, sales talk from sales assistants when all i want to do is lower your resistance, no rhythm in cymbals no tempo in drums, love's on arrival, she comes when she comes, right on the target but wide of the mark... The more things change, the more they stay insane. A tall, dark stranger will have more fun than you. A long memory is the most subversive idea in America. Madison's Inquiry: If you have to travel on the Titanic, why not go first class? Boys, you have ALL been selected to LEAVE th' PLANET in 15 minutes!! One of the pleasures of reading old letters is the knowledge that they need no answer. -- George Gordon, Lord Byron Ain't nothin' an old man can do for me but bring me a message from a young man. -- Moms Mabley "Remember Kruschev: he tried to do too many things too fast, and he was removed in disgrace. If Gorbachev tries to destroy the system or make too many fundamental changes to it, I believe the system will get rid of him. I am not a political scientist, but I understand the system very well. I believe he will have a "heart attack" or retire or be removed. He is up against a brick wall. If you think they will change everything and become a free, open society, forget it!" -- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976 "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 110 After your lover has gone you will still have PEANUT BUTTER! Everybody knows that the dice are loaded. Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed. Everybody knows the war is over. Everybody knows the good guys lost. Everybody knows the fight was fixed: the poor stay poor, the rich get rich. That's how it goes. Everybody knows. Everybody knows that the boat is leaking. Everybody knows the captain lied. Everybody got this broken feeling like their father or their dog just died. Everybody talking to their pockets. Everybody wants a box of chocolates and long stem rose. Everybody knows. Everybody knows that you love me, baby. Everybody knows that you really do. Everybody knows that you've been faithful, give or take a night or two. Everybody knows you've been discreet, but there were so many people you just had to meet without your clothes. And everybody knows. And everybody knows it's now or never. Everybody knows that it's me or you. And everybody knows that you live forever when you've done a line or two. Everybody knows the deal is rotten: Old Black Joe's still pickin' cotton for you ribbons and bows. And everybody knows. -- Leonard Cohen, "Everybody Knows" Ask yourself whether you are happy and you cease to be so. -- John Stuart Mill ***** Special AI Seminar (abstract) It has been widely recognized that AI programs require expert knowledge in order to perform well in complex domains. But knowledge alone is not sufficient for some applications; wisdom is needed as well. Accordingly, we have developed a new approach to artificial intelligence which we call "wisdom engineering". As a test of our ideas, we have written IMMANUEL, a wisdom based system for the task domain of western philosophical thought. IMMANUEL was supplied initially with 200 wisdom units which contained wisdom about such elementary concepts as mind, matter, being, nothingness, and so forth. IMMANUEL was then allowed to run freely, guided by the heuristic rules contained in its heterarchically organized meta wisdom base. IMMANUEL succeeded in rediscovering most of the important philosophical ideas developed in western culture over the course of the last 25 centuries, including those underlying Plato's theory of government, Kant's metaphysics, Nietzsche's theory of value, and Husserl's phenomenology. In this seminar, we will describe IMMANUEL's achievements and internal architecture. We will also briefly discuss our recent efforts to apply wisdom engineering to oil exploration. Uh-oh!! I'm having TOO MUCH FUN!! There's no easy quick way out, we're gonna have to live through our whole lives, win, lose, or draw. -- Walt Kelly When you and I are far apart Can sorrow break your tender heart? I love you darling, yes I do; Sleep is so sweet when I dream of you; All you are is a blossoming rose. Night is here so I must close. With care read the first word of each line. You will find a question of mine. -- Yours hopefully, The VAX. Well, I'm INVISIBLE AGAIN ... I might as well pay a visit to the LADIES ROOM ... I'm all for computer dating, but I wouldn't want one to marry my sister. * Dry-ice can't code his way out of a paper bag dry-ice: int main() { ExitPaperBag(); return 0; } Is that how that's done then? *takes notes* Good government never depends upon laws, but upon the personal qualities of those who govern. The machinery of government is always subordinate to the will of those who administer that machinery. The most important element of government, therefore, is the method of choosing leaders. -- Frank Herbert, "Children of Dune" 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" I'm in direct contact with many advanced fun CONCEPTS. I DON'T THINK I'M ALONE when I say I'd like to see more and more planets fall under the ruthless domination of our solar system. -- Jack Handey, The New Mexican, 1988. Beggars should be no choosers. -- John Heywood "I'd love to go out with you, but I want to spend more time with my blender." Let me assure you that to us here at First National, you're not just a number. Youre two numbers, a dash, three more numbers, another dash and another number. -- James Estes This is the ____LAST time I take travel suggestions from Ray Bradbury! WARNING TO ALL PERSONNEL: Firings will continue until morale improves. If we do not change our direction we are likely to end up where we are headed. Tcl tends to get ported to weird places like routers. -- Larry Wall in <199710071721.KAA19014@wall.org> The human race has one really effective weapon, and that is laughter. -- Mark Twain Put *that* in you .sig and smoke it, Knghtbrd. You know he will read this :> heheheheh. Kiss me twice. I'm schizophrenic. I hear what you're saying but I just don't care. One measure of friendship consists not in the number of things friends can discuss, but in the number of things they need no longer mention. -- Clifton Fadiman This door is baroquen, please wiggle Handel. (If I wiggle Handel, will it wiggle Bach?) -- Found on a door in the MSU music building An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest. -- Benjamin Franklin Chance is perhaps the work of God when He did not want to sign. -- Anatole France Difficulty Practice no-action; Attend to do-nothing; Taste the flavorless, Magnify the small, Multiply the few, Return love for hate. Deal with the difficult while it is yet easy; Deal with the great while it is yet small; The difficult develops naturally from the easy, And the great from the small; So the sage, by dealing with the small, Achieves the great. Who finds it easy to promise finds it hard to be trusted; Who takes things lightly finds things difficult; The sage recognizes difficulty, and so has none. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" Beware of dog. Young men are fitter to invent than to judge; fitter for execution than for counsel; and fitter for new projects than for settled business. For the experience of age, in things that fall within the compass of it, directeth them; but in new things, abuseth them. The errors of young men are the ruin of business; but the errors of aged men amount but to this, that more might have been done, or sooner. Young men, in the conduct and management of actions, embrace more than they can hold; stir more than they can quiet; fly to the end, without consideration of the means and degrees; pursue some few principles which they have chanced upon absurdly; care not how they innovate, which draws unknown inconveniences; and, that which doubleth all errors, will not acknowledge or retract them; like an unready horse, that will neither stop nor turn. Men of age object too much, consult too long, adventure too little, repent too soon, and seldom drive business home to the full period, but content themselves with a mediocrity of success. Certainly, it is good to compound employments of both ... because the virtues of either age may correct the defects of both. -- Francis Bacon, "Essay on Youth and Age" "I went to the museum where they had all the heads and arms from the statues that are in all the other museums." -- Steven Wright It's a very *__UN*lucky week in which to be took dead. -- Churchy La Femme You will never amount to much. -- Munich Schoolmaster, to Albert Einstein, age 10 Sure he's sharp as a razor ... he's a two-dimensional pinhead! All the big corporations depreciate their possessions, and you can, too, provided you use them for business purposes. For example, if you subscribe to the Wall Street Journal, a business-related newspaper, you can deduct the cost of your house, because, in the words of U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger in a landmark 1979 tax decision: "Where else are you going to read the paper? Outside? What if it rains?" -- Dave Barry, "Sweating Out Taxes" The use of anthropomorphic terminology when dealing with computing systems is a symptom of professional immaturity. -- Edsger Dijkstra My mother is a fish. -- William Faulkner Nothing succeeds like excess. -- Oscar Wilde Said the attractive, cigar-smoking housewife to her girl-friend: "I got started one night when George came home and found one burning in the ashtray." Non-sequiturs make me eat lampshades. But you'll notice Perl has a goto. -- Larry Wall in <199710211624.JAA17833@wall.org> "Any news from the President on a successor?" he asked hopefully. "None," Anita replied. "She's having great difficulty finding someone qualified who is willing to accept the post." "Then I stay," said Dr. Fresh. "I'm not good for much, but I can at least make a decision." "Somewhere," he grumphed, "there must be a naive, opportunistic young welp with a masochistic streak who would like to run the most up-and-down bureaucracy in the history of mankind." -- R. L. Forward, "Flight of the Dragonfly" 100 buckets of bits on the bus 100 buckets of bits Take one down, short it to ground FF buckets of bits on the bus FF buckets of bits on the bus FF buckets of bits Take one down, short it to ground FE buckets of bits on the bus ad infinitum... Virtues Who understands the world is learned; Who understands the self is enlightened. Who conquers the world has strength; Who conquers the self has harmony; Who is determined has purpose. Who is contented has wealth; Who defends his home may long endure; Who surrenders his home may long survive it. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" "To your left is the marina where several senior cabinet officials keep luxury yachts for weekend cruises on the Potomac. Some of these ships are up to 100 feet in length; the Presidential yacht is over 200 feet in length, and can remain submerged for up to 3 weeks." -- Garrison Keillor Knghtbrd: Using -3dfx or -svga? Mercury will do something sane with it Mercury: both---svga sig11's, -3dfx sig4's Mercury: that's not good right? ;> Distinctive, adj.: A different color or shape than our competitors. God created a few perfect heads. The rest he covered with hair. I wonder if there's anything GOOD on tonight? Better to use medicines at the outset than at the last moment. === ALL USERS PLEASE NOTE ======================== Bug reports now amount to an average of 12,853 per day. Unfortunately, this is only a small fraction [ < 1% ] of the mail volume we receive. In order that we may more expeditiously deal with these valuable messages, please communicate them by one of the following paths: ARPA: WastebasketSLMHQ.ARPA UUCP: [berkeley, seismo, harpo]!fubar!thekid!slmhq!wastebasket Non-network sites: Federal Express to: Wastebasket Room NE43-926 Copernicus, The Moon, 12345-6789 For that personal contact feeling call 1-415-642-4948; our trained operators are on call 24 hours a day. VISA/MC accepted.* * Our very rich lawyers have assured us that we are not responsible for any errors or advice given over the phone. April 1 This is the day upon which we are reminded of what we are on the other three hundred and sixty-four. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" She's so tough she won't take 'yes' for an answer. On the night before her family moved from Kansas to California, the little girl knelt by her bed to say her prayers. "God bless Mommy and Daddy and Keith and Kim," she said. As she began to get up, she quickly added, "Oh, and God, this is goodbye. We're moving to Hollywood." Well, some take delight in the carriages a-rolling, And some take delight in the hurling and the bowling, But I take delight in the juice of the barley, And courting pretty fair maids in the morning bright and early. You will overcome the attacks of jealous associates. No one goes to that restaurant anymore-it's always too crowded. (attributed to Yogi Berra) Even more amazing was the realization that God has Internet access. I wonder if He has a full newsfeed? -- Matt Welsh It is better to have loved and lost -- much better. 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. I'll give you my opinion of the human race in a nutshell ... their heart's in the right place, but their head is a thoroughly inefficient organ. -- W. Somerset Maugham, "The Summing Up" It's not so hard to lift yourself by your bootstraps once you're off the ground. -- Daniel B. Luten I poured spot remover on my dog. Now he's gone. -- Steven Wright No animal should ever jump on the dining room furniture unless absolutely certain he can hold his own in conversation. -- Fran Lebowitz You can't start worrying about what's going to happen. You get spastic enough worrying about what's happening now. -- Lauren Bacall All of the animals except man know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it. If you want to program in C, program in C. It's a nice language. I use it occasionally... :-) -- Larry Wall in <7577@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> teamwork, n.: Having someone to blame. The propriety of some persons seems to consist in having improper thoughts about their neighbours. -- F. H. Bradley Felix Catus is your taxonomic nomenclature, An endothermic quadroped, carnivorous by nature. Your visual, olfactory, and auditory senses Contribute to your hunting skills and natural defenses. I find myself intrigued by your sub-vocal oscillations, A singular development of cat communications That obviates your basic hedonistic predelection For a rhythmic stroking of your fur to demonstrate affection. A tail is quite essential for your acrobatic talents: You would not be so agile if you lacked its counterbalance; And when not being utilitized to aid in locomotion, It often serves to illustrate the state of your emotion. Oh Spot, the complex levels of behavior you display Connote a fairly well-developed cognitive array. And though you are not sentient, Spot, and do not comprehend, I nonetheless consider you a true and valued friend. -- Lt. Cmdr. Data, "An Ode to Spot" I don't have any solution but I certainly admire the problem. -- Ashleigh Brilliant Life is a grand adventure -- or it is nothing. -- Helen Keller If it weren't for the last minute, nothing would ever get done. As I was going up Punch Card Hill, Feeling worse and worser, There I met a C.R.T. And it drop't me a cursor. C.R.T., C.R.T., Phosphors light on you! If I had fifty hours a day I'd spend them all at you. -- Uncle Colonel's Cursory Rhymes Bigamy is having one spouse too many. Monogamy is the same. There is no realizable power that man cannot, in time, fashion the tools to attain, nor any power so secure that the naked ape will not abuse it. So it is written in the genetic cards -- only physics and war hold him in check. And also the wife who wants him home by five, of course. -- Encyclopadia Apocryphia, 1990 ed. YOW!! Now I understand advanced MICROBIOLOGY and th' new TAX REFORM laws!! teamwork, n.: Having someone to blame. Which is worse: ignorance or apathy? Who knows? Who cares? Life is an exciting business, and most exciting when it is lived for others. One family builds a wall, two families enjoy it. The only difference between a car salesman and a computer salesman is that the car salesman knows he's lying. Do you think that illiterate people get the full effect of alphabet soup? Amoebit: Amoeba/rabbit cross; it can multiply and divide at the same time. Thus spake the master programmer: "When you have learned to snatch the error code from the trap frame, it will be time for you to leave." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" The voluptuous blond was chatting with her handsome escort in a posh restaurant when their waiter, stumbling as he brought their drinks, dumped a martini on the rocks down the back of the blonde's dress. She sprang to her feet with a wild rebel yell, dashed wildly around the table, then galloped wriggling from the room followed by her distraught boyfriend. A man seated on the other side of the room with a date of his own beckoned to the waiter and said, "We'll have two of whatever she was drinking." Truth is free, but information costs. This is the first numerical problem I ever did. It demonstrates the power of computers: Enter lots of data on calorie & nutritive content of foods. Instruct the thing to maximize a function describing nutritive content, with a minimum level of each component, for fixed caloric content. The results are that one should eat each day: 1/2 chicken 1 egg 1 glass of skim milk 27 heads of lettuce. -- Rev. Adrian Melott A well-known friend is a treasure. You too can wear a nose mitten. Be sociable. Speak to the person next to you in the unemployment line tomorrow. Support Mental Health. Or I'll kill you. Gosh that takes me back... or is it forward? That's the trouble with time travel, you never can tell." -- Doctor Who, "Androids of Tara" "It's a summons." "What's a summons?" "It means summon's in trouble." -- Rocky and Bullwinkle Try to get all of your posthumous medals in advance. Some husbands are living proof that a woman can take a joke. 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" ... ich bin in einem dusenjet ins jahr 53 vor chr ... ich lande im antiken Rom ... einige gladiatoren spielen scrabble ... ich rieche PIZZA ... The price of success in philosophy is triviality. -- C. Glymour. The odds are a million to one against your being one in a million. ...though his invention worked superbly -- his theory was a crock of sewage from beginning to end. -- Vernor Vinge, "The Peace War" No one knows like a woman how to say things that are at once gentle and deep. -- Hugo Anyone who knows history, particularly the history of Europe, will, I think, recognize that the domination of education or of government by any one particular religious faith is never a happy arrangement for the people. -- Eleanor Roosevelt Somewhere, just out of sight, the unicorns are gathering. A famous Lisp Hacker noticed an Undergraduate sitting in front of a Xerox 1108, trying to edit a complex Klone network via a browser. Wanting to help, the Hacker clicked one of the nodes in the network with the mouse, and asked "what do you see?" Very earnestly, the Undergraduate replied "I see a cursor." The Hacker then quickly pressed the boot toggle at the back of the keyboard, while simultaneously hitting the Undergraduate over the head with a thick Interlisp Manual. The Undergraduate was then Enlightened. As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport. -- Shakespeare, "King Lear" Memory should be the starting point of the present. We decided it was night again, so we camped for twenty minutes and drank another six beers at a Young Life campsite. O.C. got into the supervisory adult's sleeping bag and ran around in it. "This is the judgment day and I'm a terrifying apparition," he screamed. Then the heat made O.C. ralph in the bag. -- The Utterly Monstrous, Mind-Roasting Summer of O.C. and Stiggs, National Lampoon, October 1982 Potahto' Pictures Productions Presents: THE TATERNATOR: Cyborg spud returns from the future to present-day McDonald's restaurant to kill the potatoess (girl 'tater) who will give birth to the world's largest french fry (The Dark Powers of Burger King are clearly behind this). Most quotable line: "Ah'll be baked..." A FISTFUL OF FRIES: Western in which our hero, The Spud with No Name, rides into a town that's deprived of carbohydrates thanks to the evil takeover of the low-cal Scallopinni Brothers. Plenty of smokeouts, fry-em-ups, and general butter-melting by all. FOR A FEW FRIES MORE: Takes up where AFOF left off! Cameo by Walter Cronkite, as every man's common 'tater! The early worm gets the bird. Why won't you let me kiss you goodnight? Is it something I said? -- Tom Ryan I hate it when my foot falls asleep during the day cause that means it's going to be up all night. -- Steven Wright Q: What is green and lives in the ocean? A: Moby Pickle. The problem here (as someon else stated) is that when multiple dists use the same package format it only gives a "false sense of compatibility". -- Stephen Carpenter Pudder's Law: Anything that begins well will end badly. (Note: The converse of Pudder's law is not true.) Life is a process, not a principle, a mystery to be lived, not a problem to be solved. -- Gerard Straub, television producer and author (stolen from Frank Herbert??) Be sociable. Speak to the person next to you in the unemployment line tomorrow. Look, we play the Star Spangled Banner before every game. You want us to pay income taxes, too? -- Bill Veeck, Chicago White Sox You don't have to wait--you can have it in 5.004_54 or so. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199710221740.KAA24455@wall.org> Time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so. -- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Didn't I buy a 1951 Packard from you last March in Cairo? Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few. -- G. B. Shaw Winning isn't everything, but losing isn't anything. MOUNT TAPE U1439 ON B3, NO RING If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants. -- Isaac Newton In the sciences, we are now uniquely priviledged to sit side by side with the giants on whose shoulders we stand. -- Gerald Holton If I have not seen as far as others, it is because giants were standing on my shoulders. -- Hal Abelson Mathematicians stand on each other's shoulders. -- Gauss Mathemeticians stand on each other's shoulders while computer scientists stand on each other's toes. -- Richard Hamming It has been said that physicists stand on one another's shoulders. If this is the case, then programmers stand on one another's toes, and software engineers dig each other's graves. -- Unknown It's not easy, being green. -- Kermit the Frog The Surgeon General has determined that cigarette smoking is hazardous to your health. Everyone is more or less mad on one point. -- Rudyard Kipling Aphasia: Loss of speech in social scientists when asked at parties, "But of what use is your research?" I cannot conceive that anybody will require multiplications at the rate of 40,000 or even 4,000 per hour ... -- F. H. Wales (1936) Your fault -- core dumped You don't have to be nice to people on the way up if you're not planning on coming back down. -- Oliver Warbucks, "Annie" Getting kicked out of the American Bar Association is liked getting kicked out of the Book-of-the-Month Club. -- Melvin Belli on the occcasion of his getting kicked out of the American Bar Association The best that we can do is to be kindly and helpful toward our friends and fellow passengers who are clinging to the same speck of dirt while we are drifting side by side to our common doom. -- Clarence Darrow By trying we can easily learn to endure adversity. Another man's, I mean. -- Mark Twain Promptness is its own reward, if one lives by the clock instead of the sword. The all-softening overpowering knell, The tocsin of the soul, -- the dinner bell. -- Lord Byron Ignorance is bliss. -- Thomas Gray Fortune updates the great quotes, #42: BLISS is ignorance. BEWARE! People acting under the influence of human nature. Why do they call it baby-SITTING when all you do is run after them? "If you want to travel around the world and be invited to speak at a lot of different places, just write a Unix operating system." (By Linus Torvalds) "Here at the Phone Company, we serve all kinds of people; from Presidents and Kings to the scum of the earth ..." Judges, as a class, display, in the matter of arranging alimony, that reckless generosity which is found only in men who are giving away someone else's cash. -- P. G. Wodehouse, "Louder and Funnier" It's not? Are you saying that you SHOULD allow people (other than William Wallace) to shoot lightning bolts from their arse? -- Seth Galbraith Fortune Documents the Great Legal Decisions: We think that we may take judicial notice of the fact that the term "bitch" may imply some feeling of endearment when applied to a female of the canine species but that it is seldom, if ever, so used when applied to a female of the human race. Coming as it did, reasonably close on the heels of two revolver shots directed at the person of whom it was probably used, we think it carries every reasonable implication of ill-will toward that person. -- Smith v. Moran, 193 N.E. 2d 466. So far as we are human, what we do must be either evil or good: so far as we do evil or good, we are human: and it is better, in a paradoxical way, to do evil than to do nothing: at least we exist. -- T. S. Eliot, essay on Baudelaire Some people have told me they don't think a fat penguin really embodies the grace of Linux, which just tells me they have never seen a angry penguin charging at them in excess of 100mph. They'd be a lot more careful about what they say if they had. -- Linus Torvalds, announcing Linux v2.0 Honesty is for the most part less profitable than dishonesty. -- Plato Bernard Shaw is an excellent man; he has not an enemy in the world, and none of his friends like him either. -- Oscar Wilde When I was little, I went into a pet shop and they asked how big I'd get. -- Rodney Dangerfield Throw away documentation and manuals, and users will be a hundred times happier. Throw away privileges and quotas, and users will do the Right Thing. Throw away proprietary and site licenses, and there won't be any pirating. If these three aren't enough, just stay at your home directory and let all processes take their course. Monitored by the American Human Association. And 1.1.81 is officially BugFree(tm), so if you receive any bug-reports on it, you know they are just evil lies. -- Linus Torvalds Telephone books are like dictionaries -- if you know the answer before you look it up, you can eventually reaffirm what you thought you knew but weren't sure. But if you're searching for something you don't already know, your fingers could walk themselves to death. -- Erma Bombeck Time will end all my troubles, but I don't always approve of Time's methods. Despite all appearances, your boss is a thinking, feeling, human being. Why do we want intelligent terminals when there are so many stupid users? I don't make the rules, Gil, I only play the game. -- Cash McCall "Consider a spherical bear, in simple harmonic motion..." -- Professor in the UCB physics department Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later. -- F. Brooks, "The Mythical Man-Month" emacs sucks, literally, not a insult, just a comment that its large enough to have a noticeable gravitational pull... Ask not what's inside your head, but what your head's inside of. -- J. J. Gibson Never tell. Not if you love your wife ... In fact, if your old lady walks in on you, deny it. Yeah. Just flat out and she'll believe it: "I'm tellin' ya. This chick came downstairs with a sign around her neck `Lay On Top Of Me Or I'll Die'. I didn't know what I was gonna do..." -- Lenny Bruce Please stand for the National Anthem: Australians all, let us rejoice, For we are young and free. We've golden soil and wealth for toil Our home is girt by sea. Our land abounds in nature's gifts Of beauty rich and rare. In history's page, let every stage Advance Australia Fair. In joyful strains then let us sing, Advance Australia Fair. Thank you. You may resume your seat. SEMPER UBI SUB UBI!!!! [ Always wear underwater ] THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #2: RENE Named after the famous French philosopher and mathematician Rene DesCartes, RENE is a language used for artificial intelligence. The language is being developed at the Chicago Center of Machine Politics and Programming under a grant from the Jane Byrne Victory Fund. A spokesman described the language as "Just as great as dis [sic] city of ours." The center is very pleased with progress to date. They say they have almost succeeded in getting a VAX to think. However, sources inside the organization say that each time the machine fails to think it ceases to exist. Some restrictions may apply. "Consequences, Schmonsequences, as long as I'm rich." -- "Ali Baba Bunny" [1957, Chuck Jones] Shipping not included. Dying is one of the few things that can be done as easily lying down. -- Woody Allen A triangle which has an angle of 135 degrees is called an obscene triangle. Most people's favorite way to end a game is by winning. Five is a sufficiently close approximation to infinity. -- Robert Firth "One, two, five." -- Monty Python and the Holy Grail Another Armenia, Belgium ... the weak innocents who always seem to be located on a natural invasion route. -- Kirk, "Errand of Mercy", stardate 3198.4 Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result. -- Winston Churchill Next to being shot at and missed, nothing is really quite as satisfying as an income tax refund. -- F. J. Raymond Do you have lysdexia? Moderation in all things. -- Publius Terentius Afer [Terence] Everybody is given the same amount of hormones, at birth, and if you want to use yours for growing hair, that's fine with me. Now I'm being INVOLUNTARILY shuffled closer to the CLAM DIP with the BROKEN PLASTIC FORKS in it!! 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. Type louder, please. First study the enemy. Seek weakness. -- Romulan Commander, "Balance of Terror", stardate 1709.2 Here I sit, broken-hearted, All logged in, but work unstarted. First net.this and net.that, And a hot buttered bun for net.fat. The boss comes by, and I play the game, Then I turn back to net.flame. Is there a cure (I need your views), For someone trapped in net.news? I need your help, I say 'tween sobs, 'Cause I'll soon be listed in net.jobs. Anyone who thinks UNIX is intuitive should be forced to write 5000 lines of code using nothing but vi or emacs. AAAAACK! -- Discussion on the intuitiveness of commands, especially Emacs Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent. -- George Orwell, "Reflections on Gandhi" A private sin is not so prejudicial in the world as a public indecency. -- Miguel de Cervantes you are not a nutcase You obviously don't know me well enough yet. => He who minds his own business is never unemployed. There are two ways of disliking poetry; one way is to dislike it, the other is to read Pope. -- Oscar Wilde I remember Ulysses well... Left one day for the post office to mail a letter, met a blonde named Circe on the streetcar, and didn't come back for 20 years. The bay-trees in our country are all wither'd And meteors fright the fixed stars of heaven; The pale-faced moon looks bloody on the earth And lean-look'd prophets whisper fearful change. These signs forerun the death or fall of kings. -- Wm. Shakespeare, "Richard II" The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as his Father, in the womb of a virgin will be classified with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter. But we may hope that the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in these United States will do away with this artificial scaffolding and restore to us the primitive and genuine doctrines of this most venerated Reformer of human errors. -- Thomas Jefferson The worst thing about some men is that when they are not drunk they are sober. -- William Butler Yeats Oblivion together does not frighten me, beloved. -- Thalassa (in Anne Mulhall's body), "Return to Tomorrow", stardate 4770.3. No man can have a reasonable opinion of women until he has long lost interest in hair restorers. -- Austin O'Malley Ah say, son, you're about as sharp as a bowlin' ball. "I honestly believe that the doctrine of hell was born in the glittering eyes of snakes that run in frightful coils watching for their prey. I believe it was born with the yelping, howling, growling and snarling of wild beasts... I despise it, I defy it, and I hate it." -- Robert G. Ingersoll You single-handedly fought your way into this hopeless mess. Graduating seniors, parents and friends... Let me begin by reassuring you that my remarks today will stand up to the most stringent requirements of the new appropriateness. The intra-college sensitivity advisory committee has vetted the text of even trace amounts of subconscious racism, sexism and classism. Moreover, a faculty panel of deconstructionists have reconfigured the rhetorical components within a post-structuralist framework, so as to expunge any offensive elements of western rationalism and linear logic. Finally, all references flowing from a white, male, eurocentric perspective have been eliminated, as have any other ruminations deemed denigrating to the political consensus of the moment. Thank you and good luck. -- Doonesbury, the University Chancellor's graduation speech. I always choose my friends for their good looks and my enemies for their good intellects. Man cannot be too careful in his choice of enemies. -- Oscar Wilde, "The Picture of Dorian Gray" I've already told you more than I know. I have already given two cousins to the war and I stand ready to sacrifice my wife's brother. -- Artemus Ward "Elves and Dragons!" I says to him. "Cabbages and potatoes are better for you and me." -- J. R. R. Tolkien Wouldn't the sentence "I want to put a hyphen between the words Fish and And and And and Chips in my Fish-And-Chips sign" have been clearer if quotation marks had been placed before Fish, and between Fish and and, and and and And, and And and and, and and and And, and And and and, and and and Chips, as well as after Chips? Woody: Hey, Mr. Peterson, what's up? Norm: The warranty on my liver. -- Cheers, Breaking In Is Hard to Do Sam: What can I do for you, Norm? Norm: Open up those beer taps and, oh, take the day off, Sam. -- Cheers, Veggie-Boyd Woody: What's going on, Mr. Peterson? Norm: Another layer for the winter, Wood. -- Cheers, It's a Wonderful Wife A fool must now and then be right by chance. Well, he didn't know what to do, so he decided to look at the government, to see what they did, and scale it down and run his life that way. -- Laurie Anderson That could certainly be done, but I don't want to fall into the Forth trap, where every running Forth implementation is really a different language. -- Larry Wall in <199705101952.MAA00756@wall.org> There is an order of things in this universe. -- Apollo, "Who Mourns for Adonais?" stardate 3468.1 Some husbands are living proof that a woman can take a joke. Conjecture: All odd numbers are prime. Mathematician's Proof: 3 is prime. 5 is prime. 7 is prime. By induction, all odd numbers are prime. Physicist's Proof: 3 is prime. 5 is prime. 7 is prime. 9 is experimental error. 11 is prime. 13 is prime ... Engineer's Proof: 3 is prime. 5 is prime. 7 is prime. 9 is prime. 11 is prime. 13 is prime ... Computer Scientists's Proof: 3 is prime. 3 is prime. 3 is prime. 3 is prime... Did YOU find a DIGITAL WATCH in YOUR box of VELVEETA? Love makes fools, marriage cuckolds, and patriotism malevolent imbeciles. -- Paul Leautaud, "Passe-temps" You don't become a failure until you're satisfied with being one. Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught. -- Oscar Wilde, "The Critic as Artist" If we won't stand together, we don't stand a chance. A chronic disposition to inquiry deprives domestic felines of vital qualities. What are 'bots'? <``Erik> rsg is a bot, not a human, not a human usable client, just a bot. <``Erik> about the same as a quake bot, except irc bots are (usually) built to help, not shoot your ass full of holes The happiest time of a person's life is after his first divorce. -- J. K. Galbraith The anger of a woman is the greatest evil with which you can threaten your enemies. -- Bonnard The man on tops walks a lonely street; the "chain" of command is often a noose. Harris's Lament: All the good ones are taken. YOW!! Now I understand advanced MICROBIOLOGY and th' new TAX REFORM laws!! You do not have mail. He played the king as if afraid someone else would play the ace. -- John Mason Brown, drama critic See store for details. Please remain seated until the ride has come to a complete stop. Go on, EMOTE! I was RAISED on thought balloons!! No group of professionals meets except to conspire against the public at large. -- Mark Twain Reading computer manuals without the hardware is as frustrating as reading sex manuals without the software. -- Arthur C Clarke 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_ Paul's Law: You can't fall off the floor. Nothing endures but change. -- Heraclitus Practice is the best of all instructors. -- Publilius When the speaker and he to whom he is speaks do not understand, that is metaphysics. -- Voltaire "I am not sure what this is, but an `F' would only dignify it." -- English Professor O give me a home, Where the buffalo roam, Where the deer and the antelope play, Where seldom is heard A discouraging word, 'Cause what can an antelope say? If condition persists, consult your physician. He who attacks the fundamentals of the American broadcasting industry attacks democracy itself. -- William S. Paley, chairman of CBS brain-damaged, generalization of "Honeywell Brain Damage" (HBD), a theoretical disease invented to explain certain utter cretinisms in Multics, adj: Obviously wrong; cretinous; demented. There is an implication that the person responsible must have suffered brain damage, because he/she should have known better. Calling something brain-damaged is bad; it also implies it is unusable. "[In 'Doctor' mode], I spent a good ten minutes telling Emacs what I thought of it. (The response was, 'Perhaps you could try to be less abusive.')" (By Matt Welsh) It is illegal to drive more than two thousand sheep down Hollywood Boulevard at one time. When there are two conflicting versions of the story, the wise course is to believe the one in which people appear at their worst. -- H. Allen Smith, "Let the Crabgrass Grow" They will only cause the lower classes to move about needlessly. -- The Duke of Wellington, on early steam railroads. Aim for the moon. If you miss, you may hit a star. -- W. Clement Stone The net is like a vast sea of lutefisk with tiny dinosaur brains embedded in it here and there. Any given spoonful will likely have an IQ of 1, but occasional spoonfuls may have an IQ more than six times that! -- James 'Kibo' Parry I'm a GENIUS! I want to dispute sentence structure with SUSAN SONTAG!! Her locks an ancient lady gave Her loving husband's life to save; And men -- they honored so the dame -- Upon some stars bestowed her name. But to our modern married fair, Who'd give their lords to save their hair, No stellar recognition's given. There are not stars enough in heaven. I've got a COUSIN who works in the GARMENT DISTRICT ... To err is human, to moo bovine. Die, v.: To stop sinning suddenly. -- Elbert Hubbard Hating the Yankees is as American as pizza pie, unwed mothers and cheating on your income tax. -- Mike Royko A bird in the hand is worth what it will bring. The more pretentious a corporate name, the smaller the organization. (For instance, The Murphy Center for Codification of Human and Organizational Law, contrasted to IBM, GM, AT&T ...) Symptom: Drinking fails to give taste and satisfaction, beer is unusually pale and clear. Problem: Glass empty. Action Required: Find someone who will buy you another beer. Symptom: Drinking fails to give taste and satisfaction, and the front of your shirt is wet. Fault: Mouth not open when drinking or glass applied to wrong part of face. Action Required: Buy another beer and practice in front of mirror. Drink as many as needed to perfect drinking technique. -- Bar Troubleshooting Q: Why should you always serve a Southern Carolina football man soup in a plate? A: 'Cause if you give him a bowl, he'll throw it away. It's gonna be alright, It's almost midnight, And I've got two more bottles of wine. ... an anecdote from IBM's Yorktown Heights Research Center. When a programmer used his new computer terminal, all was fine when he was sitting down, but he couldn't log in to the system when he was standing up. That behavior was 100 percent repeatable: he could always log in when sitting and never when standing. Most of us just sit back and marvel at such a story; how could that terminal know whether the poor guy was sitting or standing? Good debuggers, though, know that there has to be a reason. Electrical theories are the easiest to hypothesize: was there a loose wire under the carpet, or problems with static electricity? But electrical problems are rarely consistently reproducible. An alert IBMer finally noticed that the problem was in the terminal's keyboard: the tops of two keys were switched. When the programmer was seated he was a touch typist and the problem went unnoticed, but when he stood he was led astray by hunting and pecking. -- "Programming Pearls" column, by Jon Bentley in CACM February 1985 It appears that PL/I (and its dialects) is, or will be, the most widely used higher level language for systems programming. -- J. Sammet You're growing out of some of your problems, but there are others that you're growing into. Per buck you get more computing action with the small computer. -- R. W. Hamming Mathematicians practice absolute freedom. -- Henry Adams Nothing ever becomes real till it is experienced -- even a proverb is no proverb to you till your life has illustrated it. -- John Keats This door is baroquen, please wiggle Handel. (If I wiggle Handel, will it wiggle Bach?) -- Found on a door in the MSU music building lawsuit, n.: A machine which you go into as a pig and come out as a sausage. -- Ambrose Bierce Bo Derek ruined my life! Go not to the elves for counsel, for they will say both yes and no. -- J.R.R. Tolkien You work very hard. Don't try to think as well. You're at Witt's End. "I will make no bargains with terrorist hardware." -- Peter da Silva When you are working hard, get up and retch every so often. The turtle lives 'twixt plated decks Which practically conceal its sex. I think it clever of the turtle In such a fix to be so fertile. -- Ogden Nash Thus spake the master programmer: "Though a program be but three lines long, someday it will have to be maintained." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" There is a certain impertinence in allowing oneself to be burned for an opinion. -- Anatole France In Christianity, a man may have only one wife. This is called Monotony. Do you realize how many holes there could be if people would just take the time to take the dirt out of them? Solutions are obvious if one only has the optical power to observe them over the horizon. -- K. A. Arsdall You've always made the mistake of being yourself. -- Eugene Ionesco You will be successful in your work. Do not drink coffee in early A.M. It will keep you awake until noon. Is your job running? You'd better go catch it! I found Rome a city of bricks and left it a city of marble. -- Augustus Caesar /* * Oops. The kernel tried to access some bad page. We'll have to * terminate things with extreme prejudice. */ die_if_kernel("Oops", regs, error_code); -- From linux/arch/i386/mm/fault.c The leaves were long, the grass was green, The hemlock-umbels tall and fair, And in the glade a light was seen Of stars in shadow shimmering. Tin'uviel was dancing there To music of a pipe unseen, And light of stars was in her hair, And in her raiment glimmering. There Beren came from mountains colds, And lost he wandered under leaves, And where the Elven-river rolled He walked alone and sorrowing. He peered between the hemlock-leaves And saw in wonder flowers of gold Upon her mantle and her sleeves, And her hair like shadow following. Enchantment healed his weary feet That over hills were doomed to roam; And forth he hastened, strong and fleet, And grasped at moonbeams glistening. Through woven woods in Elvenhome She lightly fled on dancing feet, And left him lonely still to roam In the silent forest listening. -- J. R. R. Tolkien 'Naomi, sex at noon taxes.' I moan. Never odd or even. A man, a plan, a canal, Panama. Madam, I'm Adam. Sit on a potato pan, Otis. Sit on Otis. -- The Mad Palindromist If you took all the students that felt asleep in class and laid them end to end, they'd be a lot more comfortable. -- "Graffiti in the Big Ten" I'm proud of my humility. -- I love KATRINKA because she drives a PONTIAC. We're going away now. I fed the cat. You will remember, Watson, how the dreadful business of the Abernetty family was first brought to my notice by the depth which the parsley had sunk into the butter upon a hot day. -- Sherlock Holmes If I am elected, the concrete barriers around the WHITE HOUSE will be replaced by tasteful foam replicas of ANN MARGARET! BAD CRAZINESS, MAN!!! Money doesn't talk, it swears. -- Bob Dylan Leadership involves finding a parade and getting in front of it; what is happening in America is that those parades are getting smaller and smaller -- and there are many more of them. -- John Naisbitt, "Megatrends" The avoidance of taxes is the only intellectual pursuit that carries any reward. -- John Maynard Keynes Collaboration, n.: A literary partnership based on the false assumption that the other fellow can spell. Marriage always demands the greatest understanding of the art of insincerity possible between two human beings. -- Vicki Baum War spares not the brave, but the cowardly. -- Anacreon The autodecrement is not magical. -- Larry Wall in the perl man page Fortune finishes the great quotations, #21 Shall I compare thee to a Summer day? No, I guess not. Touch tone phones only. That's the thing about people who think they hate computers. What they really hate is lousy programmers. -- Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle in "Oath of Fealty" Happiness isn't having what you want, it's wanting what you have. "It's a step forward although there was no progress." President Hosni Murbarak of Egypt attempting to put the best face on a disappointing summit meeting between President Clinton and the Syrian dictator Hafez Assad. George Bernard Shaw once sent two tickets to the opening night of one of his plays to Winston Churchill with the following note: "Bring a friend, if you have one." Churchill wrote back, returning the two tickets and excused himself as he had a previous engagement. He also attached the following: "Please send me two tickets for the next night, if there is one." Offer void where prohibited by law. Certainly the game is rigged. Don't let that stop you; if you don't bet, you can't win. -- Robert Heinlein, "Time Enough For Love" 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 * woot is now known as woot-dinner * Knghtbrd sprinkles a little salt on woot I've never had a woot before... Hope they taste good noooo! don't eat me! * Knghtbrd decides he does not want a dinner that talks to him... hehe Always think of something new; this helps you forget your last rotten idea. -- Seth Frankel What the world *really* needs is a good Automatic Bicycle Sharpener. No one can put you down without your full cooperation. My interest is in the future because I am going to spend the rest of my life there. If the ends don't justify the means, then what does? -- Robert Moses Reunite Gondwondaland! job interview, n.: The excruciating process during which personnel officers separate the wheat from the chaff -- then hire the chaff. I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter. -- Blaise Pascal Be cautious in your daily affairs. knghtbrd: Quake should support xray vision, dammit pretzelgod: ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/quake/partial_conversions/ xrated/i_am_old_enough_to_look_at_this ... you asked ... haha, that is a real directory However, on religious issues there can be little or no compromise. There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this supreme being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God's name on one's behalf should be used sparingly. The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both. I'm frankly sick and tired of the political preachers across this country telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in "A," "B," "C," and "D." Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me? And I am even more angry as a legislator who must endure the threats of every religious group who thinks it has some God-granted right to control my vote on every roll call in the Senate. I am warning them today: I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of "conservatism." -- Senator Barry Goldwater, from the Congressional Record, September 16, 1981 After they got rid of capital punishment, they had to hang twice as many people as before. No one wants war. -- Kirk, "Errand of Mercy", stardate 3201.7 The Ruffed Pandanga of Borneo and Rotherham spreads out his feathers in his courtship dance and imitates Winston Churchill and Tommy Cooper on one leg. The padanga is dying out because the female padanga doesn't take it too seriously. -- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac" /* * Oops. The kernel tried to access some bad page. We'll have to * terminate things with extreme prejudice. */ die_if_kernel("Oops", regs, error_code); -- From linux/arch/i386/mm/fault.c Always remember that you are unique. Just like everyone else. UNIX is hot. It's more than hot. It's steaming. It's quicksilver lightning with a laserbeam kicker. -- Michael Jay Tucker The major advances in civilization are processes that all but wreck the societies in which they occur. -- A. N. Whitehead The right half of the brain controls the left half of the body. This means that only left handed people are in their right mind. Some stirring may be necessary to achieve proper consistency. What's all this brouhaha? The question is, why are politicians so eager to be president? What is it about the job that makes it worth revealing, on national television, that you have the ethical standards of a slime-coated piece of industrial waste? -- Dave Barry, "On Presidential Politics" The Official MBA Handbook on business cards: Avoid overly pretentious job titles such as "Lord of the Realm, Defender of the Faith, Emperor of India" or "Director of Corporate Planning." Reception area, n.: The purgatory where office visitors are condemned to spend innumerable hours reading dog-eared back issues of trade magazines like Modern Plastics, Chain Saw Age, and Chicken World, while the receptionist blithely reads her own trade magazine -- Cosmopolitan. "I don't mind going nowhere as long as it's an interesting path." -- Ronald Mabbitt #define SIGILL 6 /* blech */ -- Larry Wall in perl.c from the perl source code I will be known as Ian Black, Ean can be Ian Red, Netgod Ian Blue, Che gets Ian Yellow, CQ is Ian Purple and Joey is Ian Indigo -- Some #Debian channel Eric Raymond: I want to live in a world where software doesn't suck. Richard Stallman: Any software that isn't free sucks. Linus Torvalds: I'm interested in free beer. Richard Stallman: That's okay, as long as I don't have to drink it. I don't like beer. -- LinuxWorld Expo panel, 4 March 1999 Forms follow function, and often obliterate it. This bag is recyclable. New Hampshire law forbids you to tap your feet, nod your head, or in any way keep time to the music in a tavern, restaurant, or cafe. To live is always desirable. -- Eleen the Capellan, "Friday's Child", stardate 3498.9 Fun Facts, #14: In table tennis, whoever gets 21 points first wins. That's how it once was in baseball -- whoever got 21 runs first won. > (It's sorta like sed, but not. It's sorta like awk, but not. etc.) Guilty as charged. Perl is happily ugly, and happily derivative. -- Larry Wall in <1992Aug26.184221.29627@netlabs.com> Do I have a lifestyle yet? Have a nice diurnal anomaly. The one sure way to make a lazy man look respectable is to put a fishing rod in his hand. Now I know someone out there is going to claim, "Well then, UNIX is intuitive, because you only need to learn 5000 commands, and then everything else follows from that! Har har har!" -- Andy Bates on "intuitive interfaces", slightly defending Macs In the olden days in England, you could be hung for stealing a sheep or a loaf of bread. However, if a sheep stole a loaf of bread and gave it to you, you would only be tried for receiving, a crime punishable by forty lashes with the cat or the dog, whichever was handy. If you stole a dog and were caught, you were punished with twelve rabbit punches, although it was hard to find rabbits big enough or strong enough to punch you. -- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac" Historic Overdosing: To live in a period of time when too much seems to happen. Major symptoms include addiction to newspapers, magazines, and TV news broadcasts. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Families, when a child is born Want it to be intelligent. I, through intelligence, Having wrecked my whole life, Only hope the baby will prove Ignorant and stupid. Then he will crown a tranquil life By becoming a Cabinet Minister -- Su Tung-p'o I'm so broke I can't even pay attention. A freelance is one who gets paid by the word -- per piece or perhaps. -- Robert Benchley Anxious after the delay, Gruber doesn't waste any time getting the Koenig [a modified Porsche] up to speed, and almost immediately we are blowing off Alfas, Fiats, and Lancias full of excited Italians. These people love fast cars. But they love sport too and no passing encounter goes unchallenged. Nothing serious, just two wheels into your lane as you're bearing down on them at 130-plus -- to see if you're paying attention. -- Road & Track article about driving two absurdly fast cars across Europe. Nobody can be exactly like me. Sometimes even I have trouble doing it. -- Tallulah Bankhead After any salary raise, you will have less money at the end of the month than you did before. It's amazing how much "mature wisdom" resembles being too tired. On a normal ascii line, the only safe condition to detect is a 'BREAK' - everything else having been assigned functions by Gnu EMACS. -- Tarl Neustaedter Q: What's the difference between a Mac and an Etch-a-Sketch? A: You don't have to shake the Mac to clear the screen. I'm not available for comment.. Humans are communications junkies. We just can't get enough. -- Alan Kay Once, there was NO fun ... This was before MENU planning, FASHION statements or NAUTILUS equipment ... Then, in 1985 ... FUN was completely encoded in this tiny MICROCHIP ... It contain 14,768 vaguely amusing SIT-COM pilots!! We had to wait FOUR BILLION years but we finally got JERRY LEWIS, MTV and a large selection of creme-filled snack cakes! It is easier to run down a hill than up one. Never drink from your finger bowl -- it contains only water. Let me take you a button-hole lower. -- William Shakespeare, "Love's Labour's Lost" Being frustrated is disagreeable, but the real disasters in life begin when you get what you want. The history of the rise of Christianity has everything to do with politics, culture, and human frailties and nothing to do with supernatural manipulation of events. Had divine intervention been the guiding force, surely two millennia after the birth of Jesus he would not have a world where there are more Muslims than Catholics, more Hindus than Protestants, and more nontheists than Catholics and Protestants combined. -- John K. Naland, "The First Easter", Free Inquiry magazine, Vol. 8, No. 2 "What the scientists have in their briefcases is terrifying." -- Nikita Khrushchev BASIC is the Computer Science equivalent of `Scientific Creationism'. He looked at me as if I were a side dish he hadn't ordered. -- Ring Lardner brain-damaged, generalization of "Honeywell Brain Damage" (HBD), a theoretical disease invented to explain certain utter cretinisms in Multics, adj: Obviously wrong; cretinous; demented. There is an implication that the person responsible must have suffered brain damage, because he/she should have known better. Calling something brain-damaged is bad; it also implies it is unusable. Of course power tools and alcohol don't mix. Everyone knows power tools aren't soluble in alcohol... -- Crazy Nigel does Johnie Ingram hang out here on IRC? I've got a bad feeling about this. Even though they raised the rate for first class mail in the United States we really shouldn't complain -- it's still only two cents a day. [and getting better! Soon it'll be down to a penny a day!] ... but hey, this is Linux, isn't it meant to do infinite loops in 5 seconds? -- Jonathan Oxer in the apt-cacher ChangeLog If there is no wind, row. -- Polish proverb Real theology is always rather shocking to people who already think they know what they think. I'm still shocked myself. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199708261932.MAA05218@wall.org> Overfiend - BTW, after we've discovered X takes all of 1.4 GIGS to build, are you willing admit that X is bloatware? => KB: there is a 16 1/2 minute gap in my answer knghtbrd: evidence exists that X is only the *2nd* worst windowing system ;) Give me a sleeping pill and tell me your troubles. The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all your time. David Letterman's "Things we can be proud of as Americans": * Greatest number of citizens who have actually boarded a UFO * Many newspapers feature "JUMBLE" * Hourly motel rates * Vast majority of Elvis movies made here * Didn't just give up right away during World War II like some countries we could mention * Goatees & Van Dykes thought to be worn only by weenies * Our well-behaved golf professionals * Fabulous babes coast to coast The entire CHINESE WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL TEAM all share ONE personality -- and have since BIRTH!! Charm is a way of getting the answer "Yes" -- without having asked any clear question. I'm having an emotional outburst!! A woman, especially if she have the misfortune of knowing anything, should conceal it as well as she can. -- Jane Austen I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve. -- J. R. R. Tolkien Roses are red; Violets are blue. I'm schizophrenic, And so am I. Hale Mail Rule, The: When you are ready to reply to a letter, you will lack at least one of the following: (a) A pen or pencil or typewriter. (b) Stationery. (c) Postage stamp. (d) The letter you are answering. There must be at least 500,000,000 rats in the United States; of course, I never heard the story before. INSIDE, I have the same personality disorder as LUCY RICARDO!! Humor in the Court: Q: Could you see him from where you were standing? A: I could see his head. Q: And where was his head? A: Just above his shoulders. To everything there is a season, a time for every pupose under heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; A time to plant, and a time to pluck what is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; A time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; A time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones; A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to gain, and a time to lose; A time to keep, and a time to throw away; A time to tear, and a time to sew; A time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; A time of war, and a time of peace. Ecclesiastes 3:1-9 In Tulsa, Oklahoma, it is against the law to open a soda bottle without the supervision of a licensed engineer. My geometry teacher was sometimes acute, and sometimes obtuse, but always, always, he was right. [That's an interesting angle. I wonder if there are any parallels?] The nice thing about standards is that there are so many of them to choose from. -- Andrew S. Tanenbaum Never let your schooling interfere with your education. Spock: The odds of surviving another attack are 13562190123 to 1, Captain. If Patrick Henry thought that taxation without representation was bad, he should see how bad it is with representation. Many people resent being treated like the person they really are. I always turn to the sports pages first, which record people's accomplishments. The front page has nothing but man's failures. -- Chief Justice Earl Warren Mencken and Nathan's Fifteenth Law of The Average American: The worst actress in the company is always the manager's wife. No passes accepted for this engagement. It seems these two guys, George and Harry, set out in a Hot Air balloon to cross the United States. After forty hours in the air, George turned to Harry, and said, "Harry, I think we've drifted off course! We need to find out where we are." Harry cools the air in the balloon, and they descend to below the cloud cover. Slowly drifting over the countryside, George spots a man standing below them and yells out, "Excuse me! Can you please tell me where we are?" The man on the ground yells back, "You're in a balloon, approximately fifty feet in the air!" George turns to Harry and says, "Well, that man *must* be a lawyer". Replies Harry, "How can you tell?". "Because the information he gave us is 100% accurate, and totally useless!" That's the end of The Joke, but for you people who are still worried about George and Harry: they end up in the drink, and make the front page of the New York Times: "Balloonists Soaked by Lawyer". Don't SANFORIZE me!! "Linux poses a real challenge for those with a taste for late-night hacking (and/or conversations with God)." (By Matt Welsh) Biology is the only science in which multiplication means the same thing as division. A penny saved is a penny taxed. "One basic notion underlying Usenet is that it is a cooperative." Having been on USENET for going on ten years, I disagree with this. The basic notion underlying USENET is the flame. -- Chuq Von Rospach The average individual's position in any hierarchy is a lot like pulling a dogsled -- there's no real change of scenery except for the lead dog. Getting the job done is no excuse for not following the rules. Corollary: Following the rules will not get the job done. Not only is this incomprehensible, but the ink is ugly and the paper is from the wrong kind of tree. -- Professor, EECS, George Washington University I'm looking forward to working with you on this next year. -- Professor, Harvard, on a senior thesis. When I was crossing the border into Canada, they asked if I had any firearms with me. I said, "Well, what do you need?" -- Steven Wright "Despite its suffix, skepticism is not an "ism" in the sense of a belief or dogma. It is simply an approach to the problem of telling what is counterfeit and what is genuine. And a recognition of how costly it may be to fail to do so. To be a skeptic is to cultivate "street smarts" in the battle for control of one's own mind, one's own money, one's own allegiances. To be a skeptic, in short, is to refuse to be a victim. -- Robert S. DeBear, "An Agenda for Reason, Realism, and Responsibility," New York Skeptic (newsletter of the New York Area Skeptics, Inc.), Spring 1988 Thus spake the master programmer: "Time for you to leave." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" Necessity is a mother. The hardest thing is to disguise your feelings when you put a lot of relatives on the train for home. There is something you must understand about the Soviet system. They have the ability to concentrate all their efforts on a given design, and develop all components simultaneously, but sometimes without proper testing. Then they end up with a technological disaster like the Tu-144. In a technology race at the time, that aircraft was two months ahead of the Concorde. Four Tu-144s were built; two have crashed, and two are in museums. The Concorde has been flying safely for over 10 years. -- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976 "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 100 Fishing, with me, has always been an excuse to drink in the daytime. -- Jimmy Cannon Money cannot buy love, nor even friendship. 8) Use common sense in routing cable. Avoid wrapping coax around sources of strong electric or magnetic fields. Do not wrap the cable around flourescent light ballasts or cyclotrons, for example. -- Ethernet Headstart Product, Information and Installation Guide, Bell Technologies, pg. 11 Nasrudin walked into a teahouse and declaimed, "The moon is more useful than the sun." "Why?", he was asked. "Because at night we need the light more." You enjoy the company of other people. Conjecture: All odd numbers are prime. Mathematician's Proof: 3 is prime. 5 is prime. 7 is prime. By induction, all odd numbers are prime. Physicist's Proof: 3 is prime. 5 is prime. 7 is prime. 9 is experimental error. 11 is prime. 13 is prime ... Engineer's Proof: 3 is prime. 5 is prime. 7 is prime. 9 is prime. 11 is prime. 13 is prime ... Computer Scientists's Proof: 3 is prime. 3 is prime. 3 is prime. 3 is prime... Look DEEP into the OPENINGS!! Do you see any ELVES or EDSELS ... or a HIGHBALL?? ... Conceit causes more conversation than wit. -- LaRouchefoucauld I don't get no respect. Scintillation is not always identification for an auric substance. 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. You know you're in trouble when... (1) Your only son tells you he wishes Anita Bryant would mind her own business. (2) You put your bra on backwards and it fits better. (3) You call Suicide Prevention and they put you on hold. (4) You see a `60 Minutes' news team waiting in your office. (5) Your birthday cake collapses from the weight of the candles. (6) Your 4-year old reveals that it's "almost impossible" to flush a grapefruit down the toilet. (7) You realize that you've memorized the back of the cereal box. You can't expect a boy to be vicious till he's been to a good school. -- H. H. Munro how are we going to pronounce '00 or '01 or '02 and so on? Say goodbye to the nineties, say hello to the naughties. :) Chapter VIII Due to the convergence of forces beyond his comprehension, Salvatore Quanucci was suddenly squirted out of the universe like a watermelon seed, and never heard from again. Imitation is the sincerest form of television. -- Fred Allen There are many times when you want it to ignore the rest of the string just like atof() does. Oddly enough, Perl calls atof(). How convenient. :-) -- Larry Wall in <1991Jun24.231628.14446@jpl-devvax.jpl.nasa.gov> Microsoft is not the answer. Microsoft is the question. NO (or Linux) is the answer. (Taken from a .signature from someone from the UK, source unknown) It is illegal to say "Oh, Boy" in Jonesboro, Georgia. Q: Do you know what the death rate around here is? A: One per person. Famous last words: (1) "Don't worry, I can handle it." (2) "You and what army?" (3) "If you were as smart as you think you are, you wouldn't be a cop." In the war of wits, he's unarmed. Love IS what it's cracked up to be. belief, n: Something you do not believe. "I'd love to go out with you, but there are important world issues that need worrying about." Let's do it. -- Gary Gilmore, to his firing squad Established technology tends to persist in the face of new technology. -- G. Blaauw, one of the designers of System 360 Your heart is pure, and your mind clear, and your soul devout. All the evidence concerning the universe has not yet been collected, so there's still hope. Jane and I got mixed up with a television show -- or as we call it back east here: TV -- a clever contraction derived from the words Terrible Vaudeville. However, it is our latest medium -- we call it a medium because nothing's well done. It was discovered, I suppose you've heard, by a man named Fulton Berle, and it has already revolutionized social grace by cutting down parlour conversation to two sentences: "What's on television?" and "Good night". -- Goodman Ace, letter to Groucho Marx, in The Groucho Letters, 1967 The two things that can get you into trouble quicker than anything else are fast women and slow horses. SHHHH!! I hear SIX TATTOOED TRUCK-DRIVERS tossing ENGINE BLOCKS into empty OIL DRUMS ... A cynic is a person searching for an honest man, with a stolen lantern. -- Edgar A. Shoaff To love is good, love being difficult. 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. Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed. -- Francis Bacon "In matrimony, to hesitate is sometimes to be saved." -- Butler philosophy: Unintelligible answers to insoluble problems. If you cannot in the long run tell everyone what you have been doing, your doing was worthless. -- Edwim Schrodinger UNIX Shell is the Best Fourth Generation Programming Language It is the UNIX shell that makes it possible to do applications in a small fraction of the code and time it takes in third generation languages. In the shell you process whole files at a time, instead of only a line at a time. And, a line of code in the UNIX shell is one or more programs, which do more than pages of instructions in a 3GL. Applications can be developed in hours and days, rather than months and years with traditional systems. Most of the other 4GLs available today look more like COBOL or RPG, the most tedious of the third generation languages. "UNIX Relational Database Management: Application Development in the UNIX Environment" by Rod Manis, Evan Schaffer, and Robert Jorgensen. Prentice Hall Software Series. Brian Kerrighan, Advisor. 1988. damn, the autonomous mouse movement starts usually after I use a mouse button don't use a mouse button then :) yeah, right :) Something's rotten in the state of Denmark. -- Shakespeare I came to MIT to get an education for myself and a diploma for my mother. My polyvinyl cowboy wallet was made in Hong Kong by Montgomery Clift! Once, there was NO fun ... This was before MENU planning, FASHION statements or NAUTILUS equipment ... Then, in 1985 ... FUN was completely encoded in this tiny MICROCHIP ... It contain 14,768 vaguely amusing SIT-COM pilots!! We had to wait FOUR BILLION years but we finally got JERRY LEWIS, MTV and a large selection of creme-filled snack cakes! Stanford women are responsible for the success of many Stanford men: they give them "just one more reason" to stay in and study every night. Wouldn't the sentence "I want to put a hyphen between the words Fish and And and And and Chips in my Fish-And-Chips sign" have been clearer if quotation marks had been placed before Fish, and between Fish and and, and and and And, and And and and, and and and And, and And and and, and and and Chips, as well as after Chips? He asked me if I knew what time it was -- I said yes, but not right now. -- Steven Wright One fine day, the bus driver went to the bus garage, started his bus, and drove off along the route. No problems for the first few stops -- a few people got on, a few got off, and things went generally well. At the next stop, however, a big hulk of a guy got on. Six feet eight, built like a wrestler, arms hanging down to the ground. He glared at the driver and said, "Big John doesn't pay!" and sat down at the back. Did I mention that the driver was five feet three, thin, and basically meek? Well, he was. Naturally, he didn't argue with Big John, but he wasn't happy about it. Well, the next day the same thing happened -- Big John got on again, made a show of refusing to pay, and sat down. And the next day, and the one after that, and so forth. This grated on the bus driver, who started losing sleep over the way Big John was taking advantage of him. Finally he could stand it no longer. He signed up for bodybuilding courses, karate, judo, and all that good stuff. By the end of the summer, he had become quite strong; what's more, he felt really good about himself. So on the next Monday, when Big John once again got on the bus and said "Big John doesn't pay!," the driver stood up, glared back at the passenger, and screamed, "And why not?" With a surprised look on his face, Big John replied, "Big John has a bus pass." My reason tells me that land cannot be sold - nothing can be sold but such things as can be carried away. Black Hawk, (Saulk) "I'm really enjoying not talking to you ... Let's not talk again ____REAL soon ..." 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!" Do not stamp. Experience is a good teacher, but she sends in terrific bills. -- Minna Antrim, "Naked Truth and Veiled Allusions" Your mind understands what you have been taught; your heart, what is true. The two party system ... is a triumph of the dialectic. It showed that two could be one and one could be two and had probably been fabricated by Hegel for the American market on a subcontract from General Dynamics. -- I. F. Stone The more cordial the buyer's secretary, the greater the odds that the competition already has the order. Snacktrek, n.: The peculiar habit, when searching for a snack, of constantly returning to the refrigerator in hopes that something new will have materialized. -- Rich Hall, "Sniglets" No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible. Decisions of the judges will be final unless shouted down by a really over- whelming majority of the crowd present. Abusive and obscene language may not be used by contestants when addressing members of the judging panel, or, conversely, by members of the judging panel when addressing contestants (unless struck by a boomerang). -- Mudgeeraba Creek Emu-Riding and Boomerang-Throwing Assoc. Somewhere on this globe, every ten seconds, there is a woman giving birth to a child. She must be found and stopped. -- Sam Levenson Has everyone noticed that all the letters of the word "database" are typed with the left hand? Now the layout of the QWERTYUIOP typewriter keyboard was designed, among other things, to facilitate the even use of both hands. It follows, therefore, that writing about databases is not only unnatural, but a lot harder than it appears. Kramer's Law: You can never tell which way the train went by looking at the tracks. Being schizophrenic is better than living alone. I am deeply CONCERNED and I want something GOOD for BREAKFAST! Don't kid yourself. Little is relevant, and nothing lasts forever. The honeymoon is not actually over until we cease to stifle our sighs and begin to stifle our yawns. -- Helen Rowland So little time, so little to do. -- Oscar Levant McJob: A low-pay, low-prestige, low-benefit, no-future job in the service sector. Frequently considered a satisfying career choice by those who have never held one. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" It's amazing how much "mature wisdom" resembles being too tired. Behold, the fool saith, "Put not all thine eggs in the one basket"--which is but a manner of saying, "Scatter your money and your attention;" but the wise man saith, "Put all your eggs in the one basket and--WATCH THAT BASKET." -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" "The number of Unix installations has grown to 10, with more expected." -- The Unix Programmer's Manual, 2nd Edition, June, 1972 Do not throw cigarette butts in the urinal, for they are subtle and quick to anger. "If we were meant to fly, we wouldn't keep losing our luggage." Paul's Law: You can't fall off the floor. To love is good, love being difficult. He who laughs last is probably your boss. That is the true season of love, when we believe that we alone can love, that no one could have loved so before us, and that no one will love in the same way as us. -- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe The USA is so enormous, and so numerous are its schools, colleges and religious seminaries, many devoted to special religious beliefs ranging from the unorthodox to the dotty, that we can hardly wonder at its yielding a more bounteous harvest of gobbledegook than the rest of the world put together. -- Sir Peter Medawar How many retured bricklayers from FLORIDA are out purchasing PENCIL SHARPENERS right NOW?? All work and no pay makes a housewife. A couch is as good as a chair. If I had only known, I would have been a locksmith. -- Albert Einstein QOTD: Y'know how s'm people treat th'r body like a TEMPLE? Well, I treat mine like 'n AMUSEMENT PARK... S'great... LILO, you've got me on my knees! (from David Black, dblack@pilot.njin.net, with apologies to Derek and the Dominos, and Werner Almsberger) "You can't survive by sucking the juice from a wet mitten." -- Charles Schulz, "Things I've Had to Learn Over and Over and Over" You've been telling me to relax all the way here, and now you're telling me just to be myself? -- The Return of the Secaucus Seven Various documentation updates and bugfixes (the best way to know that a stable kernel is approaching is to notice that somebody starts to spellcheck the kernel - it has so far never failed) -- Linus Torvalds in the annoucement for pre-2.1.99-3 Oh, get ahold of yourself. Nobody's proposing that we parse English. -- Larry Wall in <199709032332.QAA21669@wall.org> Any stone in your boot always migrates against the pressure gradient to exactly the point of most pressure. -- Milt Barber Why is it that we rejoice at a birth and grieve at a funeral? It is because we are not the person involved. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" Darth Vader sleeps with a Teddywookie. I'll give you my opinion of the human race in a nutshell ... their heart's in the right place, but their head is a thoroughly inefficient organ. -- W. Somerset Maugham, "The Summing Up" "I went to a job interview the other day, the guy asked me if I had any questions , I said yes, just one, if you're in a car traveling at the speed of light and you turn your headlights on, does anything happen? He said he couldn't answer that, I told him sorry, but I couldn't work for him then. -- Steven Wright Be warned that typing \fBkillall \fIname\fP may not have the desired effect on non-Linux systems, especially when done by a privileged user. -- From the killall manual page Don't worry about avoiding temptation -- as you grow older, it starts avoiding you. -- The Old Farmer's Almanac Life is a process, not a principle, a mystery to be lived, not a problem to be solved. -- Gerard Straub, television producer and author (stolen from Frank Herbert??) NOTE THAT THE ABOVE IS JUST AN OPINION AND SHOULD NOT BE TAKEN TO INCLUDE ANY MEASURE OF FACTUAL INFORMATION. THE SPEAKER DISCLAIMS EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE. DEAL WITH IT. Nothing is so firmly believed as that which we least know. -- Michel de Montaigne * Espy ponders an uplad queue called 'hell' so I can do dupload --to hell Ingrate, n.: A man who bites the hand that feeds him, and then complains of indigestion. Sometimes I live in the country, And sometimes I live in town. And sometimes I have a great notion, To jump in the river and drown. An algorithm must be seen to be believed. -- D. E. Knuth My darling wife was always glum. I drowned her in a cask of rum, And so made sure that she would stay In better spirits night and day. Creating computer software is always a demanding and painstaking process -- an exercise in logic, clear expression, and almost fanatical attention to detail. It requires intelligence, dedication, and an enormous amount of hard work. But, a certain amount of unpredictable and often unrepeatable inspiration is what usually makes the difference between adequacy and excellence. College football is a game which would be much more interesting if the faculty played instead of the students, and even more interesting if the trustees played. There would be a great increase in broken arms, legs, and necks, and simultaneously an appreciable diminution in the loss to humanity. -- H. L. Mencken One thing they don't tell you about doing experimental physics is that sometimes you must work under adverse conditions... like a state of sheer terror. -- W. K. Hartmann UH-OH!! I put on "GREAT HEAD-ON TRAIN COLLISIONS of the 50's" by mistake!!! "I've seen, I SAY, I've seen better heads on a mug of beer" -- Senator Claghorn Lackland's Laws: (1) Never be first. (2) Never be last. (3) Never volunteer for anything Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. -- George Santayana "If a camel flies, no one laughs if it doesn't get very far." -- Paul White I prefer the most unjust peace to the most righteous war. -- Cicero Even peace may be purchased at too high a price. -- Poor Richard Murphy was an optimist. page 46 ...a report citing a study by Dr. Thomas C. Chalmers, of the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York, which compared two groups that were being used to test the theory that ascorbic acid is a cold preventative. "The group on placebo who thought they were on ascorbic acid," says Dr. Chalmers, "had fewer colds than the group on ascorbic acid who thought they were on placebo." page 56 The placebo is proof that there is no real separation between mind and body. Illness is always an interaction between both. It can begin in the mind and affect the body, or it can begin in the body and affect the mind, both of which are served by the same bloodstream. Attempts to treat most mental diseases as though they were completely free of physical causes and attempts to treat most bodily diseases as though the mind were in no way involved must be considered archaic in the light of new evidence about the way the human body functions. -- Norman Cousins, "Anatomy of an Illness as Perceived by the Patient" <|ryan|> I don't use deb u poor man netgod: heh apt-get install task-p0rn A lot of people I know believe in positive thinking, and so do I. I believe everything positively stinks. -- Lew Col Life is one long struggle in the dark. -- Titus Lucretius Carus What does not destroy me, makes me stronger. -- Nietzsche Dinosaurs aren't extinct. They've just learned to hide in the trees. For men use, if they have an evil turn, to write it in marble: and whoso doth us a good turn we write it in dust. -- Sir Thomas More "The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding." -- Justice Louis O. Brandeis (Olmstead vs. United States) We were so poor we couldn't afford a watchdog. If we heard a noise at night, we'd bark ourselves. -- Crazy Jimmy This was a Golden Age, a time of high adventure, rich living, and hard dying... but nobody thought so. This was a future of fortune and theft, pillage and rapine, culture and vice... but nobody admitted it. -- Alfred Bester, "The Stars My Destination" HOW TO PROVE IT, PART 7 proof by forward reference: Reference is usually to a forthcoming paper of the author, which is often not as forthcoming as at first. proof by semantic shift: Some of the standard but inconvenient definitions are changed for the statement of the result. proof by appeal to intuition: Cloud-shaped drawings frequently help here. Like punning, programming is a play on words. Talkers are no good doers. -- William Shakespeare, "Henry VI" innovate /IN no vait/ vb.: 1. To appropriate third-party technology through purchase, imitation, or theft and to integrate it into a de-facto, monopoly-position product. 2. To increase in size or complexity but not in utility; to reduce compatibility or interoperability. 3. To lock-out competitors or to lock-in users. 4. To charge more money; to increase prices or costs. 5. To acquire profits from investments in other companies but not from direct product or service sales. 6. To stifle or manipulate a free market; to extend monopoly powers into new markets. 7. To evade liability for wrong-doings; to get off. 8. To purchase legislation, legislators, legislatures, or chiefs of state. 9. To mediate all transactions in a global economy; to embezzle; to co-opt power (coup d'état). Cf. innovate, English usage (antonym). -- csbruce, in a Slashdot post Decision maker, n.: The person in your office who was unable to form a task force before the music stopped. October. This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks in. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August, and February. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" ...you might as well skip the Xmas celebration completely, and instead sit in front of your linux computer playing with the all-new-and-improved linux kernel version. -- Linus Torvalds 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! Youth -- not a time of life but a state of mind... a predominance of courage over timidity, of the appetite for adventure over the love of ease. -- Robert F. Kennedy Loud burping while walking around the airport is prohibited in Halstead, Kansas. Arthur's Laws of Love: (1) People to whom you are attracted invariably think you remind them of someone else. (2) The love letter you finally got the courage to send will be delayed in the mail long enough for you to make a fool of yourself in person. osteopornosis: A degenerate disease. I've got all the money I'll ever need if I die by 4 o'clock. -- Henny Youngman All of the true things I am about to tell you are shameless lies. -- The Book of Bokonon / Kurt Vonnegut Jr. System restarting, wait... Theory of Selective Supervision: The one time in the day that you lean back and relax is the one time the boss walks through the office. That's the true harbinger of spring, not crocuses or swallows returning to Capistrano, but the sound of a bat on a ball. -- Bill Veeck laser, n.: Failed death ray. The price of greatness is responsibility. The biggest difference between time and space is that you can't reuse time. -- Merrick Furst The Great Movie Posters: They hungered for her treasure! And died for her pleasure! SEE Man-Fish Battle Shark-Man-Killer! -- The Golden Mistress (1954) See Jane Russell in 3-D; She'll Knock Both Your Eyes Out! -- The French Line (1954) See Jane Russell Shake Her Tamborines... and Drive Cornel WILDE! -- Hot Blood (1956) The correct way to punctuate a sentence that starts: "Of course it is none of my business, but --" is to place a period after the word "but." Don't use excessive force in supplying such a moron with a period. Cutting his throat is only a momentary pleasure and is bound to get you talked about. -- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love" I do not believe that this generation of Americans is willing to resign itself to going to bed each night by the light of a Communist moon... -- Lyndon B. Johnson It's more than magnificent-it's mediocre. -Samuel Goldwyn What use is magic if it can't save a unicorn? -- Peter S. Beagle, "The Last Unicorn" 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. The urge to gamble is so universal and its practice so pleasurable that I assume it must be evil. -- Heywood Broun "There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it." -- C. S. Lewis, "The Chronicles of Narnia" Humor in the Court: Q: Are you qualified to give a urine sample? A: Yes, I have been since early childhood. malpractice, n.: The reason surgeons wear masks. The surest way to remain a winner is to win once, and then not play any more. Jane and I got mixed up with a television show -- or as we call it back east here: TV -- a clever contraction derived from the words Terrible Vaudeville. However, it is our latest medium -- we call it a medium because nothing's well done. It was discovered, I suppose you've heard, by a man named Fulton Berle, and it has already revolutionized social grace by cutting down parlour conversation to two sentences: "What's on television?" and "Good night". -- Goodman Ace, letter to Groucho Marx, in The Groucho Letters, 1967 The first rule of intelligent tinkering is to save all the parts. -- Paul Erlich < Keybuk> Perl 6 scares me < doogie> you can name your operators anything. the name here is the string '~|_|~' * Lo-lan-2 runs away screaming < Keybuk> it looks like a diagram of a canal lock :) < jaybonci> japanese smiley operators? < nickr> ^_^ -- in #debian-devel Illegal aliens have always been a problem in the United States. Ask any Indian. -- Robert Orben Immigration is the sincerest form of flattery. -- Jack Paar IBM's original motto: Cogito ergo vendo; vendo ergo sum. Growing old isn't bad when you consider the alternatives. -- Maurice Chevalier Yow! Am I in Milwaukee? If reporters don't know that truth is plural, they ought to be lawyers. -- Tom Wicker Now I lay me back to sleep. The speaker's dull; the subject's deep. If he should stop before I wake, Give me a nudge for goodness' sake. -- Anonymous God isn't dead. He just doesn't want to get involved. Those who don't understand Linux are doomed to reinvent it, poorly. -- unidentified source We laugh at the Indian philosopher, who to account for the support of the earth, contrived the hypothesis of a huge elephant, and to support the elephant, a huge tortoise. If we will candidly confess the truth, we know as little of the operation of the nerves, as he did of the manner in which the earth is supported: and our hypothesis about animal spirits, or about the tension and vibrations of the nerves, are as like to be true, as his about the support of the earth. His elephant was a hypothesis, and our hypotheses are elephants. Every theory in philosophy, which is built on pure conjecture, is an elephant; and every theory that is supported partly by fact, and partly by conjecture, is like Nebuchadnezzar's image, whose feet were partly of iron, and partly of clay. -- Thomas Reid, "An Inquiry into the Human Mind", 1764 Nadia Comaneci, simple perfection. -- '76 Olympics When alerted to an intrusion by tinkling glass or otherwise, 1) Calm yourself 2) Identify the intruder 3) If hostile, kill him. Step number 3 is of particular importance. If you leave the guy alive out of misguided softheartedness, he will repay your generosity of spirit by suing you for causing his subsequent paraplegia and seek to force you to support him for the rest of his rotten life. In court he will plead that he was depressed because society had failed him, and that he was looking for Mother Teresa for comfort and to offer his services to the poor. In that lawsuit, you will lose. If, on the other hand, you kill him, the most that you can expect is that a relative will bring a wrongful death action. You will have two advantages: first, there be only your story; forget Mother Teresa. Second, even if you lose, how much could the bum's life be worth anyway? A Lot less than 50 years worth of paralysis. Don't play George Bush and Saddam Hussein. Finish the job. -- G. Gordon Liddy's "Forbes" column on personal security While most peoples' opinions change, the conviction of their correctness never does. I like your game but we have to change the rules. Newman's Discovery: Your best dreams may not come true; fortunately, neither will your worst dreams. Matz's Law: A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking. The assertion that "all men are created equal" was of no practical use in effecting our separation from Great Britain and it was placed in the Declaration not for that, but for future use. -- Abraham Lincoln There is a vast difference between the savage and civilized man, but it is never apparent to their wives until after breakfast. -- Helen Rowland "History is a tool used by politicians to justify their intentions." -- Ted Koppel Only a fool fights in a burning house. -- Kank the Klingon, "Day of the Dove", stardate unknown Show night or time may vary in your market. I am a computer. I am dumber than any human and smarter than any administrator. Preserve the old, but know the new. There must be at least 500,000,000 rats in the United States; of course, I never heard the story before. Somewhere on this globe, every ten seconds, there is a woman giving birth to a child. She must be found and stopped. -- Sam Levenson Licensed and bonded. Failure is more frequently from want of energy than want of capital. genius, n.: Person clever enough to be born in the right place at the right time of the right sex and to follow up this advantage by saying all the right things to all the right people. Hey, diddle, diddle the overflow pdl To get a little more stack; If that's not enough then you lose it all And have to pop all the way back. You know you're in trouble when... (1) Your only son tells you he wishes Anita Bryant would mind her own business. (2) You put your bra on backwards and it fits better. (3) You call Suicide Prevention and they put you on hold. (4) You see a `60 Minutes' news team waiting in your office. (5) Your birthday cake collapses from the weight of the candles. (6) Your 4-year old reveals that it's "almost impossible" to flush a grapefruit down the toilet. (7) You realize that you've memorized the back of the cereal box. Prizes are for children. -- Charles Ives, upon being given, but refusing, the Pulitzer prize Turn the other cheek. -- Jesus Christ In California they don't throw their garbage away -- they make it into television shows. -- Woody Allen, "Annie Hall" 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 * aj thinks Kb^Zzz ought to pick different things to dream about than general resolutions and policy changes. aj - tell me about it, this is a Bad Sign It is the quality rather than the quantity that matters. -- Lucius Annaeus Seneca If the master dies and the disciple grieves, the lives of both have been wasted. The capacity of human beings to bore one another seems to be vastly greater than that of any other animals. Some of their most esteemed inventions have no other apparent purpose, for example, the dinner party of more than two, the epic poem, and the science of metaphysics. -- H. L. Mencken Logic is a little bird, sitting in a tree; that smells *_____awful*. That secret you've been guarding, isn't. We'll be recording at the Paradise Friday night. Live, on the Death label. -- Swan, "Phantom of the Paradise" Factorials were someone's attempt to make math LOOK exciting. What the scientists have in their briefcases is terrifying. -- Nikita Khruschev The bug stops here. I have an existential map. It has "You are here" written all over it. -- Steven Wright "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 Nonsense and beauty have close connections. -- E. M. Forster "There is such a fine line between genius and stupidity." -- David St. Hubbins, "Spinal Tap" I'll turn over a new leaf. -- Miguel de Cervantes "I went to the museum where they had all the heads and arms from the statues that are in all the other museums." -- Steven Wright HOW TO PROVE IT, PART 3 proof by obfuscation: A long plotless sequence of true and/or meaningless syntactically related statements. proof by wishful citation: The author cites the negation, converse, or generalization of a theorem from the literature to support his claims. proof by funding: How could three different government agencies be wrong? proof by eminent authority: 'I saw Karp in the elevator and he said it was probably NP- complete.' Now I know someone out there is going to claim, "Well then, UNIX is intuitive, because you only need to learn 5000 commands, and then everything else follows from that! Har har har!" -- Andy Bates on "intuitive interfaces", slightly defending Macs ... the HIGHWAY is made out of LIME JELLO and my HONDA is a barbequeued OYSTER! Yum! Be a better psychiatrist and the world will beat a psychopath to your door. I suppose that in a few hours I will sober up. That's such a sad thought. I think I'll have a few more drinks to prepare myself. "Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods." -- Albert Einstein Some bachelors want a meaningful overnight relationship. It's a trackball for one so it's not a rodent it's a turd with a ball sticking out which you fondle constantly 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. May those that love us love us; and those that don't love us, may God turn their hearts; and if he doesn't turn their hearts, may he turn their ankles so we'll know them by their limping. [We] use bad software and bad machines for the wrong things. -- R. W. Hamming Nudists are people who wear one-button suits. Antonym, n.: The opposite of the word you're trying to think of. It is the wisdom of crocodiles, that shed tears when they would devour. -- Francis Bacon We is confronted with insurmountable opportunities. -- Walt Kelly, "Pogo" I was trying not to mention backtracking. Which, of course, means that yours is "righter" than mine, in a theoretical sense. -- Larry Wall in <199710211624.JAA17833@wall.org> Excessive login or logout messages are a sure sign of senility. Keep this and all chemicals out of the reach of children. You should all JUMP UP AND DOWN for TWO HOURS while I decide on a NEW CAREER!! Yow! Are you the self-frying president? Swim at your own risk. Women aren't as mere as they used to be. -- Pogo The human instinct to censor thrives, as it always will, living in irrepressible conflict with the human instinct to speak. Outrage, self-righteousness, and paranoia feed the maw of censorship. Squelching speech, however, never reduces society's net paranoia quotient; it simply redirects it, drives it underground, where it festers into more dangerous hysterias. In the words of Justice Brandeis, "Men feared witches and burned women." -- Rodney Smolla, "Free Speech in an Open Society", p. 43. Today is a good day for information-gathering. Read someone else's mail file. We may not return the affection of those who like us, but we always respect their good judgement. Zippy's brain cells are straining to bridge synapses ... Advancement in position. Bachelors' wives and old maids' children are always perfect. -- Nicolas Chamfort Once a word has been allowed to escape, it cannot be recalled. -- Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Horace) FORTUNE PROVIDES QUESTIONS FOR THE GREAT ANSWERS: #21 A: Dr. Livingston I. Presume. Q: What's Dr. Presume's full name? If this is a service economy, why is the service so bad? Hating the Yankees is as American as pizza pie, unwed mothers and cheating on your income tax. -- Mike Royko Give me a fish and I will eat today. Teach me to fish and I will eat forever. Peace, n.: In international affairs, a period of cheating between two periods of fighting. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" The secret of happiness is total disregard of everybody. The advantage of being celibate is that when one sees a pretty girl one does not need to grieve over having an ugly one back home. -- Paul Leautaud, "Propos d'un jour" We dedicate this book to our fellow citizens who, for love of truth, take from their own wants by taxes and gifts, and now and then send forth one of themselves as dedicated servant, to forward the search into the mysteries and marvelous simplicities of this strange and beautiful Universe, Our home. -- "Gravitation", Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler When you become used to never being alone, you may consider yourself Americanized. Dibble's First Law of Sociology: Some do, some don't. "It ain't so much the things we don't know that get us in trouble. It's the things we know that ain't so." -- Artemus Ward aka Charles Farrar Brown I'm always looking for a new idea that will be more productive than its cost. -- David Rockefeller All most people want is a little more than they'll ever get. Humor in the Court: Q. And who is this person you are speaking of? A. My ex-widow said it. I cannot draw a cart, nor eat dried oats; If it be man's work I will do it. Quiet Great perfection seems incomplete, But does not decay; Great abundance seems empty, But does not fail. Great truth seems contradictory; Great cleverness seems stupid; Great eloquence seems awkward. As spring overcomes the cold, And autumn overcomes the heat, So calm and quiet overcome the world. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" Barbara's Rules of Bitter Experience: (1) When you empty a drawer for his clothes and a shelf for his toiletries, the relationship ends. (2) When you finally buy pretty stationary to continue the correspondence, he stops writing. Don't be irreplaceable, if you can't be replaced, you can't be promoted. Everything is possible. Pass the word. -- Rita Mae Brown, "Six of One" A woman has got to love a bad man once or twice in her life to be thankful for a good one. -- Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings A fool and his honey are soon parted. Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans. -- John Lennon, "Beautiful Boy" Government lies, and newspapers lie, but in a democracy they are different lies. What I mean (and everybody else means) by the word QUALITY cannot be broken down into subjects and predicates. This is not because Quality is so mysterious but because Quality is so simple, immediate, and direct. -- R. Pirsig, "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" "The identical is equal to itself, since it is different." -- Franco Spisani What no spouse of a writer can ever understand is that a writer is working when he's staring out the window. Two friends were out drinking when suddenly one lurched backward off his barstool and lay motionless on the floor. "One thing about Jim," the other said to the bartender, "he sure knows when to stop." Please come home with me ... I have Tylenol!! What is status? Status is when the President calls you for your opinion. Uh, no... Status is when the President calls you in to discuss a problem with him. Uh, that still ain't right... STATUS is when you're in the Oval Office talking to the President, and the phone rings. The President picks it up, listens for a minute, and hands it to you, saying, "It's for you." "It ain't over until it's over." -- Casey Stengel "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" Win95 is not a virus; a virus does something. -- unknown source Kennedy's Market Theorem: Given enough inside information and unlimited credit, you've got to go broke. 42 Becoming Using the male, being female, Being the entrance of the world, You embrace harmony And become as a newborn. Using strength, being weak, Being the root of the world, You complete harmony And become as unshaped wood. Using the light, being dark, Being the world, You perfect harmony And return to the Way. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" In order to get a loan you must first prove you don't need it. Though I respect that a lot I'd be fired if that were my job After killing Jason off and Countless screaming argonauts Bluebird of friendliness Like guardian angels it's Always near Blue canary in the outlet by the light switch Who watches over you Make a little birdhouse in your soul Not to put too fine a point on it Say I'm the only bee in your bonnet Make a little birdhouse in your soul -- "Birdhouse in your Soul", They Might Be Giants Most people don't need a great deal of love nearly so much as they need a steady supply. Life is too short to be taken seriously. -- Oscar Wilde Let us treat men and women well; Treat them as if they were real; Perhaps they are. -- Ralph Waldo Emerson The moon is a planet just like the Earth, only it is even deader. Linux poses a real challenge for those with a taste for late-night hacking (and/or conversations with God). -- Matt Welsh Q: Who cuts the grass on Walton's Mountain? A: Lawn Boy. "Freedom is still the most radical idea of all." -- Nathaniel Branden Hear about the Californian terrorist that tried to blow up a bus? Burned his lips on the exhaust pipe. I'm still waiting for the advent of the computer science groupie. You must dine in our cafeteria. You can eat dirt cheap there!!!! Oh, that sound of male ego. You travel halfway across the galaxy and it's still the same song. -- Eve McHuron, "Mudd's Women", stardate 1330.1 This is Betty Frenel. I don't know who to call but I can't reach my Food-a-holics partner. I'm at Vido's on my second pizza with sausage and mushroom. Jim, come and get me! Real Users know your home telephone number. An elephant is a mouse with an operating system. "There is nothing so deadly as not to hold up to people the opportunity to do great and wonderful things, if we wish to stimulate them in an active way." -- Dr. Harold Urey, Nobel Laureate in chemistry "Uncle Cosmo ... why do they call this a word processor?" "It's simple, Skyler ... you've seen what food processors do to food, right?" -- MacNelley, "Shoe" Studies prove that research causes cancer in 43% of laboratory rats knghtbrd- yeah, but 78% of those statistics are off by 52%... There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved. -- Darwin The light at the end of the tunnel may be an oncoming dragon. Pity the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. -- Don Marquis > The day people think linux would be better served by somebody else (FSF > being the natural alternative), I'll "abdicate". I don't think that > it's something people have to worry about right now - I don't see it > happening in the near future. I enjoy doing linux, even though it does > mean some work, and I haven't gotten any complaints (some almost timid > reminders about a patch I have forgotten or ignored, but nothing > negative so far). > > Don't take the above to mean that I'll stop the day somebody complains: > I'm thick-skinned (Lasu, who is reading this over my shoulder commented > that "thick-HEADED is closer to the truth") enough to take some abuse. > If I weren't, I'd have stopped developing linux the day ast ridiculed me > on c.o.minix. What I mean is just that while linux has been my baby so > far, I don't want to stand in the way if people want to make something > better of it (*). > > Linus > > (*) Hey, maybe I could apply for a saint-hood from the Pope. Does > somebody know what his email-address is? I'm so nice it makes you puke. (Taken from Linus's reply to someone worried about the future of Linux) Symptom: Everything has gone dark. Fault: The Bar is closing. Action Required: Panic. Symptom: You awaken to find your bed hard, cold and wet. You cannot see the bathroom light. Fault: You have spent the night in the gutter. Action Required: Check your watch to see if bars are open yet. If not, treat yourself to a lie-in. -- Bar Troubleshooting "If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he next comes to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination." -- Thomas De Quincey (1785 - 1859) He's dead, Jim. -- McCoy, "The Devil in the Dark", stardate 3196.1 The idea of male and female are universal constants. -- Kirk, "Metamorphosis", stardate 3219.8 While money doesn't buy love, it puts you in a great bargaining position. Does someone from PEORIA have a SHORTER ATTENTION span than me? Now's the time to have some big ideas Now's the time to make some firm decisions We saw the Buddha in a bar down south Talking politics and nuclear fission We see him and he's all washed up -- Moving on into the body of a beetle Getting ready for a long long crawl He ain't nothing -- he ain't nothing at all... Death and Money make their point once more In the shape of Philosophical assassins Mark and Danny take the bus uptown Deadly angels for reality and passion Have the courage of the here and now Don't taking nothing from the half-baked buddhas When you think you got it paid in full You got nothing -- you got nothing at all... We're on the road and we're gunning for the Buddha. We know his name and he mustn't get away. We're on the road and we're gunning for the Buddha. It would take one shot -- to blow him away... -- Shriekback, "Gunning for the Buddah" Humor in the Court: Q: What is your relationship with the plaintiff? A: She is my daughter. Q: Was she your daughter on February 13, 1979? Hurewitz's Memory Principle: The chance of forgetting something is directly proportional to... to... uh..... Win 98 Psychic edition: We'll tell you where you're going tomorrow Intel engineering seem to have misheard Intel marketing strategy. The phrase was "Divide and conquer" not "Divide and cock up" -- Alan Cox, iialan@www.linux.org.uk All the really good ideas I ever had came to me while I was milking a cow. -- Grant Wood They don't know how the world is shaped. And so they give it a shape, and try to make everything fit it. They separate the right from the left, the man from the woman, the plant from the animal, the sun from the moon. They only want to count to two. -- Emma Bull, "Bone Dance" Never delay the ending of a meeting or the beginning of a cocktail hour. Fortune: You will be attacked next Wednesday at 3:15 p.m. by six samurai sword wielding purple fish glued to Harley-Davidson motorcycles. Oh, and have a nice day! -- Bryce Nesbitt '84 Any circuit design must contain at least one part which is obsolete, two parts which are unobtainable, and three parts which are still under development. One does not thank logic. -- Sarek, "Journey to Babel", stardate 3842.4 VMS Beer: Requires minimal user interaction, except for popping the top and sipping. However cans have been known on occasion to explode, or contain extremely un-beer-like contents. Delores breezed along the surface of her life like a flat stone forever skipping along smooth water, rippling reality sporadically but oblivious to it consistently, until she finally lost momentum, sank, and due to an overdose of flouride as a child which caused her to suffer from chronic apathy, doomed herself to lie forever on the floor of her life as useless as an appendix and as lonely as a five-hundred pound barbell in a steroid-free fitness center. -- Winning sentence, 1990 Bulwer-Lytton bad fiction contest. A diplomatic husband said to his wife, "How do you expect me to remember your birthday when you never look any older?" Could somebody drag the Irix team kicking and screaming into the 1980's, please? I realize it might be quite painful for them, but maybe you could buy them a disco tape, so they'd feel a little bit more at home. -- Linus "Stayin' alive, stayin' alive" Torvalds "Note that if I can get you to \"su and say\" something just by asking, you have a very serious security problem on your system and you should look into it." (By Paul Vixie, vixie-cron 3.0.1 installation notes) eat Depends: cook | eat-out. But eat-out is non-free so that's out. And cook Recommends: clean-pans. -- Seen on #Debian I had another dream the other day about music critics. They were small and rodent-like with padlocked ears, as if they had stepped out of a painting by Goya. -- Stravinsky I suggest a new strategy, Artoo: let the Wookie win. -- C3P0 By nature, men are nearly alike; by practice, they get to be wide apart. -- Confucius whats wrong with rjing? it's lame :P it should NOT be possible shoving a grenade up your ass and using it as rocket propelant shouldn't be a viable technique :P ((lambda (foo) (bar foo)) (baz)) "Experience has proved that some people indeed know everything." -- Russell Baker "What is striking, however, is the general layout and integration of the system. Debian is a truly elegant Linux distribution; great care has been taken in the preparation of packages and their placement within the system. The sheer number of packages available is also impressive...." [A computer is] like an Old Testament god, with a lot of rules and no mercy. -- Joseph Campbell Lessness: A philosophy whereby one reconciles oneself with diminishing expectations of material wealth: "I've given up wanting to make a killing or be a bigshot. I just want to find happiness and maybe open up a little roadside cafe in Idaho." -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Troubles are like babies; they only grow by nursing. Wait! You have not been prepared! -- Mr. Atoz, "Tomorrow is Yesterday", stardate 3113.2 "Life, loathe it or ignore it, you can't like it." -- Marvin the paranoid android I've finally learned what "upward compatible" means. It means we get to keep all our old mistakes. -- Dennie van Tassel A homeowner's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a weekend for? What we see depends on mainly what we look for. -- John Lubbock Such a foolish notion, that war is called devotion, when the greatest warriors are the ones who stand for peace. On a clear disk you can seek forever. -- P. Denning Absence in love is like water upon fire; a little quickens, but much extinguishes it. -- Hannah More An actor's a guy who if you ain't talkin' about him, ain't listening. -- Marlon Brando Given some of the recent threads, the interactive discussions might need to be conducted on canvas, in the presence of a referee, while wearing padded gloves. ;-) -- Phil Hands He thinks the Gettysburg Address is where Lincoln lived. -- Wanda, "A Fish Called Wanda" [ ] Safeguard this message - it is an important historical document. [ ] Delete after reading -- Subversive Literature. [ ] Ignore and go back to what you were doing. SCCS, the source motel! Programs check in and never check out! -- Ken Thompson Might not be suitable for persons suffering from weak hearts. Moon, n.: 1. A celestial object whose phase is very important to hackers. See PHASE OF THE MOON. 2. Dave Moon (MOON@MC). "An organization dries up if you don't challenge it with growth." -- Mark Shepherd, former President and CEO of Texas Instruments This supersedes all previous notices. An expert is a person who avoids the small errors as he sweeps on to the grand fallacy. -- Benjamin Stolberg Tuesday After Lunch is the cosmic time of the week. Blame Saint Andreas -- it's all his fault. "...you might as well skip the Xmas celebration completely, and instead sit in front of your linux computer playing with the all-new-and-improved linux kernel version." (By Linus Torvalds) My own dear love, he is strong and bold And he cares not what comes after. His words ring sweet as a chime of gold, And his eyes are lit with laughter. He is jubilant as a flag unfurled -- Oh, a girl, she'd not forget him. My own dear love, he is all my world -- And I wish I'd never met him. -- Dorothy Parker, part 1 Perhaps the remembrance of these things will prove a source of future pleasure. -- Virgil DYSLEXICS OF THE WORLD, UNTIE! I'd rather be led to hell than managed to heaven. A real friend isn't someone you use once and then throw away. A real friend is someone you can use over and over again. When the bosses talk about improving productivity, they are never talking about themselves. The world will end in 5 minutes. Please log out. I used to be such a sweet sweet thing, 'til they got a hold of me, I opened doors for little old ladies, I helped the blind to see, I got no friends 'cause they read the papers, they can't be seen, With me, and I'm feelin' real shot down, And I'm, uh, feelin' mean, No more, Mr. Nice Guy, No more, Mr. Clean, No more, Mr. Nice Guy, They say "He's sick, he's obscene". My dog bit me on the leg today, my cat clawed my eyes, Ma's been thrown out of the social circle, and Dad has to hide, I went to church, incognito, when everybody rose, The reverend Smithy, he recognized me, And punched me in the nose, he said, (chorus) He said "You're sick, you're obscene". -- Alice Cooper, "No More Mr. Nice Guy" A star captain's most solemn oath is that he will give his life, even his entire crew, rather than violate the Prime Directive. -- Kirk, "The Omega Glory", stardate unknown When all else fails, read the instructions. [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" Ctrl+Option+Command + P + R dracus - YE GODS! That's worse than EMACS! hehehehe don't ask what that does :P This supersedes all previous notices. Come, muse, let us sing of rats! -- From a poem by James Grainger, 1721-1767 The best rebuttal to this kind of statistical argument came from the redoubtable John W. Campbell: The laws of population growth tell us that approximately half the people who were ever born in the history of the world are now dead. There is therefore a 0.5 probability that this message is being read by a corpse. If I felt any more SOPHISTICATED I would DIE of EMBARRASSMENT! IBM's original motto: Cogito ergo vendo; vendo ergo sum. A journey of a thousand miles starts under one's feet. -- Lao Tsu I'm gliding over a NUCLEAR WASTE DUMP near ATLANTA, Georgia!! In California they don't throw their garbage away -- they make it into television shows. -- Woody Allen, "Annie Hall" I have a map of the United States. It's actual size. I spent last summer folding it. People ask me where I live, and I say, "E6". -- Steven Wright Take everything in stride. Trample anyone who gets in your way. I'm ANN LANDERS!! I can SHOPLIFT!! Why are there always boycotts? Shouldn't there be girlcotts too? -- argon on #Linux It's no use crying over spilt milk -- it only makes it salty for the cat. Keep this and all chemicals out of the reach of children. Don't tell me that worry doesn't do any good. I know better. The things I worry about don't happen. -- Watchman Examiner Question: Is it better to abide by the rules until they're changed or help speed the change by breaking them? The system was down for backups from 5am to 10am last Saturday. Time sharing: The use of many people by the computer. BELA LUGOSI is my co-pilot ... Let's call it an accidental feature. -- Larry Wall Traffic signals in New York are just rough guidelines. -- David Letterman "We want to create puppets that pull their own strings." -- Ann Marion "Would this make them Marionettes?" -- Jeff Daiell "Tourists -- have some fun with New York's hard-boiled cabbies. When you get to your destination, say to your driver, "Pay? I was hitchhiking." -- David Letterman A person forgives only when they are in the wrong. Laugh, and the world ignores you. Crying doesn't help either. Ill-chosen abstraction is particularly evident in the design of the ADA runtime system. The interface to the ADA runtime system is so opaque that it is impossible to model or predict its performance, making it effectively useless for real-time systems. -- Marc D. Donner and David H. Jameson. While money doesn't buy love, it puts you in a great bargaining position. First study the enemy. Seek weakness. -- Romulan Commander, "Balance of Terror", stardate 1709.2 Mediocrity finds safety in standardization. -- Frederick Crane Then there was the ScoutMaster who got a fantastic deal on this case of Tates brand compasses for his troup; only $1.25 each! Only problem was, when they got them out in the woods, the compasses were all stuck pointing to the "W" on the dial. Moral: He who has a Tates is lost! "Daddy, Daddy, make Santa Claus go away!" "I can't, son; he's grown too powerful." "HO HO HO!" -- Duck's Breath Mystery Theatre Don't compare floating point numbers solely for equality. 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_ "Text processing has made it possible to right-justify any idea, even one which cannot be justified on any other grounds." -- J. Finnegan, USC. A child of five could understand this! Fetch me a child of five. "Remember, if it's being done correctly, here or abroad, it's ___not the U.S. Army doing it!" -- Good Morning VietNam What does education often do? It makes a straight cut ditch of a free meandering brook. -- Henry David Thoreau If you wants to get elected president, you'se got to think up some memoraboble homily so's school kids can be pestered into memorizin' it, even if they don't know what it means. -- Walt Kelly, "The Pogo Party" its hard being a lesbian withoutn breasts...people dont take you seriously Walking on water wasn't built in a day. -- Jack Kerouac Tis man's perdition to be safe, when for the truth he ought to die. Persistence in one opinion has never been considered a merit in political leaders. -- Marcus Tullius Cicero, "Ad familiares", 1st century BC "I hate the itching. But I don't mind the swelling." -- new buzz phrase, like "Where's the Beef?" that David Letterman's trying to get everyone to start saying Comparing information and knowledge is like asking whether the fatness of a pig is more or less green than the designated hitter rule." -- David Guaspari There are two types of Linux developers - those who can spell, and those who can't. There is a constant pitched battle between the two. (From one of the post-1.1.54 kernel update messages posted to c.o.l.a) The chat program is in public domain. This is not the GNU public license. If it breaks then you get to keep both pieces. (Copyright notice for the chat program) In the beginning there was nothing. And the Lord said "Let There Be Light!" And still there was nothing, but at least now you could see it. Breathe deep the gathering gloom. Watch lights fade from every room. Bed-sitter people look back and lament; another day's useless energies spent. Impassioned lovers wrestle as one. Lonely man cries for love and has none. New mother picks up and suckles her son. Senior citizens wish they were young. Cold-hearted orb that rules the night; Removes the colors from our sight. Red is grey and yellow white. But we decide which is real, and which is an illusion." -- The Moody Blues, "Days of Future Passed" "So, will the Andover party have a cash bar?" "No, there's free beer." "Uh-oh, Stallman's gonna be pissed..." -- overheard at the Bazaar, 1999 You are farsighted, a good planner, an ardent lover, and a faithful friend. Mr. Rockford? Miss Collins from the Bureau of Licenses. We got your renewal before the extended deadline but not your check. I'm sorry but at midnight you're no longer licensed as an investigator. -- "The Rockford Files" What this country needs is a good five cent nickel. The whole intent of Perl 5's module system was to encourage the growth of Perl culture rather than the Perl core. -- Larry Wall in <199705101952.MAA00756@wall.org> Fortune's Exercising Truths: 1: Richard Simmons gets paid to exercise like a lunatic. You don't. 2. Aerobic exercises stimulate and speed up the heart. So do heart attacks. 3. Exercising around small children can scar them emotionally for life. 4. Sweating like a pig and gasping for breath is not refreshing. 5. No matter what anyone tells you, isometric exercises cannot be done quietly at your desk at work. People will suspect manic tendencies as you twitter around in your chair. 6. Next to burying bones, the thing a dog enjoys mosts is tripping joggers. 7. Locking four people in a tiny, cement-walled room so they can run around for an hour smashing a little rubber ball -- and each other -- with a hard racket should immediately be recognized for what it is: a form of insanity. 8. Fifty push-ups, followed by thirty sit-ups, followed by ten chin-ups, followed by one throw-up. 9. Any activity that can't be done while smoking should be avoided. The proof that IBM didn't invent the car is that it has a steering wheel and an accelerator instead of spurs and ropes, to be compatible with a horse. -- Jac Goudsmit Did you know that clones never use mirrors? Once, there was NO fun ... This was before MENU planning, FASHION statements or NAUTILUS equipment ... Then, in 1985 ... FUN was completely encoded in this tiny MICROCHIP ... It contain 14,768 vaguely amusing SIT-COM pilots!! We had to wait FOUR BILLION years but we finally got JERRY LEWIS, MTV and a large selection of creme-filled snack cakes! The fashion wears out more apparel than the man. -- William Shakespeare, "Much Ado About Nothing" A little inaccuracy sometimes saves tons of explanation. -- H. H. Munro, "Saki" It is not enough to have great qualities, we should also have the management of them. -- La Rochefoucauld 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. Some don't prefer the pursuit of happiness to the happiness of pursuit. Arnold's Laws of Documentation: (1) If it should exist, it doesn't. (2) If it does exist, it's out of date. (3) Only documentation for useless programs transcends the first two laws. i have 4gb for /tmp What do you do with 4G /tmp? Compile X? yes It's gonna be alright, It's almost midnight, And I've got two more bottles of wine. Have you ever noticed that the people who are always trying to tell you `there's a time for work and a time for play' never find the time for play? You are the only person to ever get this message. Calling you stupid is an insult to stupid people! -- Wanda, "A Fish Called Wanda" We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it - and stay there, lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again - and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one any more. -- Mark Twain No one can feel as helpless as the owner of a sick goldfish. You will engage in a profitable business activity. Why be difficult when, with a bit of effort, you could be impossible? May your SO always know when you need a hug. Carmel, New York, has an ordinance forbidding men to wear coats and trousers that don't match. Any given program will expand to fill available memory. Grand Master Turing once dreamed that he was a machine. When he awoke he exclaimed: "I don't know whether I am Turing dreaming that I am a machine, or a machine dreaming that I am Turing!" -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" Indecision is the true basis for flexibility. Staff meeting in the conference room in 3 minutes. Karmageddon: It's like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it's like, a serious bummer. Mr and Mrs PED, can I borrow 26.7% of the RAYON TEXTILE production of the INDONESIAN archipelago? AMAZING BUT TRUE ... If all the salmon caught in Canada in one year were laid end to end across the Sahara Desert, the smell would be absolutely awful. What one believes to be true either is true or becomes true. -- John Lilly God grant us the serenity to accept the things we cannot change, courage to change the things we can, and wisdom to know the difference. Breakpoint 1, main (argc=1, argv=0xbffffc40) at main.c:29 29 printf ("Welcome to GNU Hell!\n"); -- "GNU Libtool documentation" Congratulations! You are the one-millionth user to log into our system. If there's anything special we can do for you, anything at all, don't hesitate to ask! Recurving: Leaving one job to take another that pays less but places one back on the learning curve. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"--a strange complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" Think of it! With VLSI we can pack 100 ENIACs in 1 sq. cm.! furbling, v.: Having to wander through a maze of ropes at an airport or bank even when you are the only person in line. -- Rich Hall, "Sniglets" I would like to urinate in an OVULAR, porcelain pool -- If you permit yourself to read meanings into (rather than drawing meanings out of) the evidence, you can draw any conclusion you like. -- Michael Keith, "The Bar-Code Beast", The Skeptical Enquirer Vol 12 No 4 p 416 It's grad exam time... COMPUTER SCIENCE Inside your desk you'll find a listing of the DEC/VMS operating system in IBM 1710 machine code. Show what changes are necessary to convert this code into a UNIX Berkeley 7 operating system. Prove that these fixes are bug free and run correctly. You should gain at least 150% efficiency in the new system. (You should take no more than 10 minutes on this question.) MATHEMATICS If X equals PI times R^2, construct a formula showing how long it would take a fire ant to drill a hole through a dill pickle, if the length-girth ratio of the ant to the pickle were 98.17:1. GENERAL KNOWLEDGE Describe the Universe. Give three examples. Spectacularism: A fascination with extreme situations. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" YOW!! Now I understand advanced MICROBIOLOGY and th' new TAX REFORM laws!! Never trust an automatic pistol or a D.A.'s deal. -- John Dillinger NOTICE: Anyone seen smoking will be assumed to be on fire and will be summarily put out. If you notice that a person is deceiving you, they must not be deceiving you very well. Oh, by the way, which one's Pink? -- Pink Floyd I asked the engineer who designed the communication terminal's keyboards why these were not manufactured in a central facility, in view of the small number needed [1 per month] in his factory. He explained that this would be contrary to the political concept of local self-sufficiency. Therefore, each factory needing keyboards, no matter how few, manufactures them completely, even molding the keypads. -- Isaac Auerbach, IEEE "Computer", Nov. 1979 With listening comes wisdom, with speaking repentance. The salary of the chief executive of the large corporation is not a market award for achievement. It is frequently in the nature of a warm personal gesture by the individual to himself. -- John Kenneth Galbraith, "Annals of an Abiding Liberal" But you who live on dreams, you are better pleased with the sophistical reasoning and frauds of talkers about great and uncertain matters than those who speak of certain and natural matters, not of such lofty nature. -- Leonardo Da Vinci, "The Codex on the Flight of Birds" As part of an ongoing effort to keep you, the Fortune reader, abreast of the valuable information that daily crosses the USENET, Fortune presents: News articles that answer *your* questions, #1: Newsgroups: comp.sources.d Subject: how do I run C code received from sources Keywords: C sources Distribution: na I do not know how to run the C programs that are posted in the sources newsgroup. I save the files, edit them to remove the headers, and change the mode so that they are executable, but I cannot get them to run. (I have never written a C program before.) Must they be compiled? With what compiler? How do I do this? If I compile them, is an object code file generated or must I generate it explicitly with the > character? Is there something else that must be done? When all else fails, read the instructions. A Los Angeles judge ruled that "a citizen may snore with immunity in his own home, even though he may be in possession of unusual and exceptional ability in that particular field." 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 I bought the latest computer; it came fully loaded. It was guaranteed for 90 days, but in 30 was outmoded! -- The Wall Street Journal passed along by Big Red Computer's SCARLETT I want you to organize my PASTRY trays ... my TEA-TINS are gleaming in formation like a ROW of DRUM MAJORETTES -- please don't be FURIOUS with me -- Howe's Law: Everyone has a scheme that will not work. "It's today!" said Piglet. "My favorite day," said Pooh. ... I see TOILET SEATS ... Many a man who thinks he's going on a maiden voyage with a woman finds out later that it was just a shake-down cruise. Animals can be driven crazy by putting too many in too small a pen. Homo sapiens is the only animal that voluntarily does this to himself. -- Lazarus Long I always will remember -- I was in no mood to trifle; 'Twas a year ago November -- I got down my trusty rifle I went out to shoot some deer And went out to stalk my prey -- On a morning bright and clear. What a haul I made that day! I went and shot the maximum I tied them to my bumper and The game laws would allow: I drove them home somehow, Two game wardens, seven hunters, Two game wardens, seven hunters, And a cow. And a cow. The Law was very firm, it People ask me how I do it Took away my permit-- And I say, "There's nothin' to it! The worst punishment I ever endured. You just stand there lookin' cute, It turns out there was a reason: And when something moves, you shoot." Cows were out of season, and And there's ten stuffed heads One of the hunters wasn't insured. In my trophy room right now: Two game wardens, seven hunters, And a pure-bred guernsey cow. -- Tom Lehrer, "The Hunting Song" The means-and-ends moralists, or non-doers, always end up on their ends without any means. -- Saul Alinsky In America, any boy may become president and I suppose that's just one of the risks he takes. -- Adlai Stevenson Es brilig war. Die schlichte Toven Wirrten und wimmelten in Waben; Und aller-m"umsige Burggoven Dir mohmen R"ath ausgraben. -- Lewis Carrol, "Through the Looking Glass" What's so funny? Bambification: The mental conversion of flesh and blood living creatures into cartoon characters possessing bourgeois Judeo-Christian attitudes and morals. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Ambition is a poor excuse for not having sense enough to be lazy. -- Charlie McCarthy Your heart is pure, and your mind clear, and your soul devout. The alarm clock that is louder than God's own belongs to the roommate with the earliest class. But, officer, he's not drunk, I just saw his fingers twitch! That, that is, is. That, that is not, is not. That, that is, is not that, that is not. That, that is not, is not that, that is. I have to think hard to name an interesting man who does not drink. -- Richard Burton The politician is someone who deals in man's problems of adjustment. To ask a politician to lead us is to ask the tail of a dog to lead the dog. -- Buckminster Fuller You must know that a man can have only one invulnerable loyalty, loyalty to his own concept of the obligations of manhood. All other loyalties are merely deputies of that one. -- Nero Wolfe Love means nothing to a tennis player. The first sign of maturity is the discovery that the volume knob also turns to the left. I used to think romantic love was a neurosis shared by two, a supreme foolishness. I no longer thought that. There's nothing foolish in loving anyone. Thinking you'll be loved in return is what's foolish. -- Rita Mae Brown Include me out. With the news that Nancy Reagan has referred to an astrologer when planning her husband's schedule, and reports of Californians evacuating Los Angeles on the strength of a prediction from a sixteenth-century physician and astrologer Michel de Notredame, the image of the U.S. as a scientific and technological nation has taking a bit of a battering lately. Sadly, such happenings cannot be dismissed as passing fancies. They are manifestations of a well-established "anti-science" tendency in the U.S. which, ultimately, could threaten the country's position as a technological power. . . . The manifest widespread desire to reject rationality and substitute a series of quasirandom beliefs in order to understand the universe does not augur well for a nation deeply concerned about its ability to compete with its industrial equals. To the degree that it reflects the thinking of a significant section of the public, this point of view encourages ignorance of and, indeed, contempt for science and for rational methods of approaching truth. . . . It is becoming clear that if the U.S. does not pick itself up soon and devote some effort to educating the young effectively, its hope of maintaining a semblance of leadership in the world may rest, paradoxically, with a new wave of technically interested and trained immigrants who do not suffer from the anti-science disease rampant in an apparently decaying society. -- Physicist Tony Feinberg, in "New Scientist," May 19, 1988 Top scientists agree that with the present rate of consumption, the earth's supply of gravity will be exhausted before the 24th century. As man struggles to discover cheaper alternatives, we need your help. Please... CONSERVE GRAVITY Follow these simple suggestions: (1) Walk with a light step. Carry helium balloons if possible. (2) Use tape, magnets, or glue instead of paperweights. (3) Give up skiing and skydiving for more horizontal sports like curling. (4) Avoid showers .. take baths instead. (5) Don't hang all your clothes in the closet ... Keep them in one big pile. (6) Stop flipping pancakes One man's brain plus one other will produce one half as many ideas as one man would have produced alone. These two plus two more will produce half again as many ideas. These four plus four more begin to represent a creative meeting, and the ratio changes to one quarter as many ... -- Anthony Chevins Your ignorance cramps my conversation. Four be the things I am wiser to know: Idleness, sorrow, a friend, and a foe. Four be the things I'd been better without: Love, curiosity, freckles, and doubt. Three be the things I shall never attain: Envy, content, and sufficient champagne. Three be the things I shall have till I die: Laughter and hope and a sock in the eye. -- Dorothy Parker, "Inventory" [or "Not so Deep as a Well"?] It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so ingenious. Yawd [noun, Bostonese]: the campus of Have Id. -- Webster's Unafraid Dictionary If science were explained to the average person in a way that is accessible and exciting, there would be no room for pseudoscience. But there is a kind of Gresham's Law by which in popular culture the bad science drives out the good. And for this I think we have to blame, first, the scientific community ourselves for not doing a better job of popularizing science, and second, the media, which are in this respect almost uniformly dreadful. Every newspaper in America has a daily astrology column. How many have even a weekly astronomy column? And I believe it is also the fault of the educational system. We do not teach how to think. This is a very serious failure that may even, in a world rigged with 60,000 nuclear weapons, compromise the human future. -- Carl Sagan, The Burden Of Skepticism, The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 12, Fall 87 Old Barlow was a crossing-tender at a junction where an express train demolished an automobile and its occupants. Being the chief witness, his testimony was vitally important. Barlow explained that the night was dark, and he waved his lantern frantically, but the driver of the car paid no attention to the signal. The railroad company won the case, and the president of the company complimented the old-timer for his story. "You did wonderfully," he said, "I was afraid you would waver under testimony." "No sir," exclaimed the senior, "but I sure was afraid that durned lawyer was gonna ask me if my lantern was lit." 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. Reactor error - core dumped! I will follow the good side right to the fire, but not into it if I can help it. -- Michel Eyquem de Montaigne Mathematics deals exclusively with the relations of concepts to each other without consideration of their relation to experience. -- Albert Einstein If you do not wish a man to do a thing, you had better get him to talk about it; for the more men talk, the more likely they are to do nothing else. -- Carlyle you know, Linux needs a platform game starring Tux kinda Super Marioish, but with Tux and things like little cyber bugs and borgs and that sort of thing ... And you have to jump past billgatus and hit the key to drop him into the lava and then you see some guy that looks like a RMS or someone say "Thank you for rescuing me Tux, but Linus Torvalds is in another castle!" | |-sshd---tcsh-+-dpkg-buildpacka---rules---sh---make---make---sh---make---sh---make---sh---make---sh---make---sh---make -- While packaging XFree86 for Debian GNU/Linux Nostalgia isn't what it used to be. Q: What do you call the scratches that you get when a female sheep bites you? A: Ewe nicks. Incumbent, n.: Person of liveliest interest to the outcumbents. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" 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! Marvin the Nature Lover spied a grasshopper hopping along in the grass, and in a mood for communing with nature, rare even among full-fledged Nature Lovers, he spoke to the grasshopper, saying: "Hello, friend grasshopper. Did you know they've named a drink after you?" "Really?" replied the grasshopper, obviously pleased. "They've named a drink Fred?" How many retured bricklayers from FLORIDA are out purchasing PENCIL SHARPENERS right NOW?? The truth is what is; what should be is a dirty lie. -- Lenny Bruce Soldiers who wish to be a hero Are practically zero, But those who wish to be civilians, They run into the millions. I'm a GENIUS! I want to dispute sentence structure with SUSAN SONTAG!! I think that's easier to read. Pardon me. Less difficult to read. -- Larry Wall in <199710120226.TAA06867@wall.org> Nothing is ever a total loss; it can always serve as a bad example. To see you is to sympathize. Freedom of the press is for those who happen to own one. In Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michaelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace -- and what did they produce? The cuckoo-clock. -- Orson Welles, "The Third Man" "I prefer to think that God is not dead, just drunk" -- John Huston If you are good, you will be assigned all the work. If you are real good, you will get out of it. My little brother got this fortune: nohup rm -fr /& So he did... William Safire's rules for writing as seen in the New York Times Do not put statements in the negative form. And don't start sentences with a conjunction. If you reread your work, you will find on rereading that a great deal of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing. Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do. Unqualified superlatives are the worst of all. If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is. Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky. Never, ever use repetitive redundancies. Also, avoid awkward or affected alliteration. Last, but not least, avoid cliche's like the plague. Never let your schooling interfere with your education. Bare feet magnetize sharp metal objects so they point upward from the floor -- especially in the dark. Ever wonder why fire engines are red? Because newspapers are read too. Two and Two is four. Four and four is eight. Eight and four is twelve. There are twelve inches in a ruler. Queen Mary was a ruler. Queen Mary was a ship. Ships sail the sea. There are fishes in the sea. Fishes have fins. The Finns fought the Russians. Russians are red. Fire engines are always rush'n. Therefore fire engines are red. Do not use that foreign word "ideals". We have that excellent native word "lies". -- Henrik Ibsen, "The Wild Duck" Our missions are peaceful -- not for conquest. When we do battle, it is only because we have no choice. -- Kirk, "The Squire of Gothos", stardate 2124.5 "Whatever the missing mass of the universe is, I hope it's not cockroaches!" -- Mom panic: kernel trap (ignored) "You must have an IQ of at least half a million." -- Popeye It takes both a weapon, and two people, to commit a murder. The Law of the Letter: The best way to inspire fresh thoughts is to seal the envelope. Personally, I think my choice in the mostest-superlative-computer wars has to be the HP-48 series of calculators. They'll run almost anything. And if they can't, while I'll just plug a Linux box into the serial port and load up the HP-48 VT-100 emulator. -- Jeff Dege, jdege@winternet.com About the only thing we have left that actually discriminates in favor of the plain people is the stork. George Washington was first in war, first in peace -- and the first to have his birthday juggled to make a long weekend. -- Ashley Cooper HOLY MACRO! 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] Murray's Rule: Any country with "democratic" in the title isn't. > If you don't need X then little VT-100 terminals are available for real > cheap. Should be able to find decent ones used for around $40 each. > For that price, they're a must for the kitchen, den, bathrooms, etc.. :) You're right. Can you explain this to my wife? -- Seen on c.o.l.development.system, on the subject of extra terminals I learned to play guitar just to get the girls, and anyone who says they didn't is just lyin'! -- Willie Nelson Kennedy's Market Theorem: Given enough inside information and unlimited credit, you've got to go broke. I had pancake makeup for brunch! Halley's Comet: It came, we saw, we drank. 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. Men often believe -- or pretend -- that the "Law" is something sacred, or at least a science -- an unfounded assumption very convenient to governments. For three years, the young attorney had been taking his brief vacations at this country inn. The last time he'd finally managed an affair with the innkeeper's daughter. Looking forward to an exciting few days, he dragged his suitcase up the stairs of the inn, then stopped short. There sat his lover with an infant on her lap! "Helen, why didn't you write when you learned you were pregnant?" he cried. "I would have rushed up here, we could have gotten married, and the baby would have my name!" "Well," she said, "when my folks found out about my condition, we sat up all night talkin' and talkin' and finally decided it would be better to have a bastard in the family than a lawyer." "I'd love to go out with you, but I'm taking punk totem pole carving." If we could sell our experiences for what they cost us, we would all be millionaires. -- Abigail Van Buren "I distrust a close-mouthed man. He generally picks the wrong time to talk and says the wrong things. Talking's something you can't do judiciously, unless you keep in practice. Now, sir, we'll talk if you like. I'll tell you right out, I'm a man who likes talking to a man who likes to talk." -- Sidney Greenstreet, _The Maltese Falcon_ 3M, under the Scotch brand name, manufactures a fine adhesive for art and display work. This product is called "Craft Mount". 3M suggests that to obtain the best results, one should make the bond "while the adhesive is wet, aggressively tacky." I did not know what "aggressively tacky" meant until I read today's fortune. [And who said we didn't offer equal time, huh? Ed.] I can mend the break of day, heal a broken heart, and provide temporary relief to nymphomaniacs. -- Larry Lee I remember Ulysses well... Left one day for the post office to mail a letter, met a blonde named Circe on the streetcar, and didn't come back for 20 years. Some men are so interested in their wives' continued happiness that they hire detectives to find out the reason for it. Dear Ms. Postnews: I couldn't get mail through to somebody on another site. What should I do? -- Eager Beaver Dear Eager: No problem, just post your message to a group that a lot of people read. Say, "This is for John Smith. I couldn't get mail through so I'm posting it. All others please ignore." This way tens of thousands of people will spend a few seconds scanning over and ignoring your article, using up over 16 man-hours their collective time, but you will be saved the terrible trouble of checking through usenet maps or looking for alternate routes. Just think, if you couldn't distribute your message to 9000 other computers, you might actually have to (gasp) call directory assistance for 60 cents, or even phone the person. This can cost as much as a few DOLLARS (!) for a 5 minute call! And certainly it's better to spend 10 to 20 dollars of other people's money distributing the message than for you to have to waste $9 on an overnight letter, or even 25 cents on a stamp! Don't forget. The world will end if your message doesn't get through, so post it as many places as you can. -- Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette It's no use crying over spilt milk -- it only makes it salty for the cat. Whoever dies with the most toys wins. The years of peak mental activity are undoubtedly between the ages of four and eighteen. At four we know all the questions, at eighteen all the answers. What I want is all of the power and none of the responsibility. "Just think of a computer as hardware you can program." -- Nigel de la Tierre To love is good, love being difficult. Your conscience never stops you from doing anything. It just stops you from enjoying it. Men have as exaggerated an idea of their rights as women have of their wrongs. -- E. W. Howe He who enters his wife's dressing room is a philosopher or a fool. -- Balzac It is, of course, written in Perl. Translation to C is left as an exercise for the reader. :-) -- Larry Wall in <7448@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> By the middle 1880's, practically all the roads except those in the South, were of the present standard gauge. The southern roads were still five feet between rails. It was decided to change the gauge of all southern roads to standard, in one day. This remarkable piece of work was carried out on a Sunday in May of 1886. For weeks beforehand, shops had been busy pressing wheels in on the axles to the new and narrower gauge, to have a supply of rolling stock which could run on the new track as soon as it was ready. Finally, on the day set, great numbers of gangs of track layers went to work at dawn. Everywhere one rail was loosened, moved in three and one-half inches, and spiked down in its new position. By dark, trains from anywhere in the United States could operate over the tracks in the South, and a free interchange of freight cars everywhere was possible. -- Robert Henry, "Trains", 1957 "I'd love to go out with you, but I have to stay home and see if I snore." "By long-standing tradition, I take this opportunity to savage other designers in the thin disguise of good, clean fun." -- P. J. Plauger, from his April Fool's column in April 88's "Computer Language" I'm a fuschia bowling ball somewhere in Brittany If you want to travel around the world and be invited to speak at a lot of different places, just write a Unix operating system. -- Linus Torvalds Romance, like alcohol, should be enjoyed, but should not be allowed to become necessary. -- Edgar Friedenberg If you mess with a thing long enough, it'll break. -- Schmidt We come to bury DOS, not to praise it. (Paul Vojta, vojta@math.berkeley.edu, paraphrasing a quote of Shakespeare) Men of lofty genius when they are doing the least work are most active. -- Leonardo da Vinci The linuX Files -- The Source is Out There. -- Sent in by Craig S. Bell, goat@aracnet.com Life is a sexually transmitted disease with 100% mortality. Animals can be driven crazy by putting too many in too small a pen. Homo sapiens is the only animal that voluntarily does this to himself. -- Lazarus Long Words must be weighed, not counted. There is no fool to the old fool. -- John Heywood Women's virtue is man's greatest invention. -- Cornelia Otis Skinner "Oh, 'Melia, my dear, this does everything crown! Who could have supposed I should meet you in Town? And whence such fair garments such prosperi-ty?" "Oh, didn't you know I'd been ruined?" said she. "You left us in tatters, without shoes or socks, Tired of digging potatoes, and spudding up docks; And now you've gay bracelets and bright feathers three!" "Yes: That's how we dress when we're ruined," said she. "At home in the barton you said `thee' and `thou,' And `thik oon' and `theas oon' and `t'other;' but now Your talking quite fits 'ee for compa-ny!" "Some polish is gained with one's ruin," said she. "Your hands were like paws then, your face blue and bleak But now I'm bewitched by your delicate cheek, And your little gloves fit like as on any la-dy!" "We never do work when we're ruined," said she. "You used to call home-life a hag-ridden dream, And you'd sigh, and you'd sock; but at present you seem To know not of megrims or melancho-ly!" "True. One's pretty lively when ruined," said she. "I wish I had feathers, a fine sweeping gown, And a delicate face, and could strut about Town!" "My dear--a raw country girl, such as you be, Cannot quite expect that. You ain't ruined," said she. -- Thomas Hardy Some people carve careers, others chisel them. Quid me anxius sum? [ What? Me, worry? ] There has also been some work to allow the interesting use of macro names. For example, if you wanted all of your "creat()" calls to include read permissions for everyone, you could say #define creat(file, mode) creat(file, mode | 0444) I would recommend against this kind of thing in general, since it hides the changed semantics of "creat()" in a macro, potentially far away from its uses. To allow this use of macros, the preprocessor uses a process that is worth describing, if for no other reason than that we get to use one of the more amusing terms introduced into the C lexicon. While a macro is being expanded, it is temporarily undefined, and any recurrence of the macro name is "painted blue" -- I kid you not, this is the official terminology -- so that in future scans of the text the macro will not be expanded recursively. (I do not know why the color blue was chosen; I'm sure it was the result of a long debate, spread over several meetings.) -- From Ken Arnold's "C Advisor" column in Unix Review The sun never sets on those who ride into it. -- RKO Mencken and Nathan's Ninth Law of The Average American: The quality of a champagne is judged by the amount of noise the cork makes when it is popped. And the crowd was stilled. One elderly man, wondering at the sudden silence, turned to the Child and asked him to repeat what he had said. Wide-eyed, the Child raised his voice and said once again, "Why, the Emperor has no clothes! He is naked!" -- "The Emperor's New Clothes" Q: How many members of the U.S.S. Enterprise does it take to change a light bulb? A: Seven. Scotty has to report to Captain Kirk that the light bulb in the Engineering Section is getting dim, at which point Kirk will send Bones to pronounce the bulb dead (although he'll immediately claim that he's a doctor, not an electrician). Scotty, after checking around, realizes that they have no more new light bulbs, and complains that he "canna" see in the dark. Kirk will make an emergency stop at the next uncharted planet, Alpha Regula IV, to procure a light bulb from the natives, who, are friendly, but seem to be hiding something. Kirk, Spock, Bones, Yeoman Rand and two red shirt security officers beam down to the planet, where the two security officers are promply killed by the natives, and the rest of the landing party is captured. As something begins to develop between the Captain and Yeoman Rand, Scotty, back in orbit, is attacked by a Klingon destroyer and must warp out of orbit. Although badly outgunned, he cripples the Klingon and races back to the planet in order to rescue Kirk et. al. who have just saved the natives' from an awful fate and, as a reward, been given all light bulbs they can carry. The new bulb is then inserted and the Enterprise continues on its five year mission. If what they've been doing hasn't solved the problem, tell them to do something else. -- Gerald Weinberg, "The Secrets of Consulting" The sooner our happiness together begins, the longer it will last. -- Miramanee, "The Paradise Syndrome", stardate 4842.6 Ambition, n: An overmastering desire to be vilified by enemies while living and made ridiculous by friends when dead. -- Ambrose Bierce "Being disintegrated makes me ve-ry an-gry!" "Well, if you can't believe what you read in a comic book, what *___can* you believe?!" -- Bullwinkle J. Moose [Jay Ward] Last yeer I kudn't spel Engineer. Now I are won. When love is gone, there's always justice. And when justice is gone, there's always force. And when force is gone, there's always Mom. Hi, Mom! -- Laurie Anderson Here I sit, broken-hearted, All logged in, but work unstarted. First net.this and net.that, And a hot buttered bun for net.fat. The boss comes by, and I play the game, Then I turn back to net.flame. Is there a cure (I need your views), For someone trapped in net.news? I need your help, I say 'tween sobs, 'Cause I'll soon be listed in net.jobs. 30 day money back guarantee minus shipping, 10% restocking charge, and 7% cancellation charge. Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. -- Henry David Thoreau This universe shipped by weight, not by volume. Some expansion of the contents may have occurred during shipment. "In the event of a percieved failing of the project leadership #debian is empowered to take drastic and descisive action to correct the failing, including by not limited to expelling officials, apointing new officials and generally abusing power" -- proposed amendment to Debian Constitution When in doubt, follow your heart. There is no royal road to geometry. -- Euclid Overconfidence breeds error when we take for granted that the game will continue on its normal course; when we fail to provide for an unusually powerful resource -- a check, a sacrifice, a stalemate. Afterwards the victim may wail, `But who could have dreamt of such an idiotic-looking move?' -- Fred Reinfeld, "The Complete Chess Course" I have not yet begun to byte! You'd better beat it. You can leave in a taxi. If you can't get a taxi, you can leave in a huff. If that's too soon, you can leave in a minute and a huff. -- Groucho Marx Attorney General Edwin Meese III explained why the Supreme Court's Miranda decision (holding that subjects have a right to remain silent and have a lawyer present during questioning) is unnecessary: "You don't have many suspects who are innocent of a crime. That's contradictory. If a person is innocent of a crime, then he is not a suspect." -- U.S. News and World Report, 10/14/85 "You, sir, are nothing but a pathetically lame salesdroid! I fart in your general direction!" -- Randseed on #Linux Building translators is good clean fun. -- T. Cheatham JOHN PAUL ELECTED POPE!! (George and Ringo miffed.) Yes, America is a country based on how pissed-off a group of taxed people can get. We exist as a country because we're cheap. Oh, I've seen copies [of Linux Journal] around the terminal room at The Labs. -- Dennis Ritchie IBM: I've Been Moved Idiots Become Managers Idiots Buy More Impossible to Buy Machine Incredibly Big Machine Industry's Biggest Mistake International Brotherhood of Mercenaries It Boggles the Mind It's Better Manually Itty-Bitty Machines Home life as we understand it is no more natural to us than a cage is to a cockatoo. -- George Bernard Shaw "I am ready to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter." -- Winston Churchill Ultra Short Term Nostalgia: Homesickness for the extremely recent past: "God, things seemed so much better in the world last week." -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped. -- Elbert Hubbard No animal should ever jump on the dining room furniture unless absolutely certain he can hold his own in conversation. -- Fran Lebowitz For reservations, call your travel agent. Pecor's Health-Food Principle: Never eat rutabaga on any day of the week that has a "y" in it. 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" Try to find the real tense of the report you are reading: Was it done, is it being done, or is something to be done? Reports are now written in four tenses: past tense, present tense, future tense, and pretense. Watch for novel uses of CONGRAM (CONtractor GRAMmar), defined by the imperfect past, the insufficient present, and the absolutely perfect future. -- Amrom Katz To err is human, but when the eraser wears out before the pencil, you're overdoing it a little. Experience varies directly with equipment ruined. Envy is a pain of mind that successful men cause their neighbors. -- Onasander QOTD: "Lack of planning on your part doesn't consitute an emergency on my part." "What if" is a trademark of Hewlett Packard, so stop using it in your sentences without permission, or risk being sued. For most men life is a search for the proper manila envelope in which to get themselves filed. -- Clifton Fadiman Dijkstra probably hates me. -- Linus Torvalds, in kernel/sched.c Beauty seldom recommends one woman to another. One family builds a wall, two families enjoy it. You k'n hide de fier, but w'at you gwine do wid de smoke? -- Joel Chandler Harris, proverbs of Uncle Remus idiot box, n.: The part of the envelope that tells a person where to place the stamp when they can't quite figure it out for themselves. -- Rich Hall, "Sniglets" Duckies are fun! [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 really quite something else. -- Astronomer Richard Berendzen, President, American University, on ABC News "Nightline," May 3, 1988 God made everything out of nothing, but the nothingness shows through. -- Paul Valery 'Martyrdom' is the only way a person can become famous without ability. -- George Bernard Shaw Life is like a tin of sardines. We're, all of us, looking for the key. -- Beyond the Fringe H: If a 'GOBLIN (HOB) waylays you, Slice him up before he slays you. Nothing makes you look a slob Like running from a HOB'LIN (GOB). -- The Roguelet's ABC The avocation of assessing the failures of better men can be turned into a comfortable livelihood, providing you back it up with a Ph.D. -- Nelson Algren, "Writers at Work" Q: Why shouldn't I simply delete the stuff I never use, it's just taking up space? A: This question is in the category of Famous Last Words.. -- From the Frequently Unasked Questions All a man needs out of life is a place to sit 'n' spit in the fire. One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. it is simply too painful to acknowledge -- even to ourselves -- that we've been so credulous. (So the old bamboozles tend to persist as the new bamboozles rise.) -- Carl Sagan, "The Fine Art of Baloney Detection," Parade, February 1, 1987 FORTRAN rots the brain. -- John McQuillin Condense soup, not books! Well, you know, no matter where you go, there you are. -- Buckaroo Banzai /* * [...] Note that 120 sec is defined in the protocol as the maximum * possible RTT. I guess we'll have to use something other than TCP * to talk to the University of Mars. * PAWS allows us longer timeouts and large windows, so once implemented * ftp to mars will work nicely. */ -- from /usr/src/linux/net/inet/tcp.c, concerning RTT [round trip time] 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" Once upon a time, when I was training to be a mathematician, a group of us bright young students taking number theory discovered the names of the smaller prime numbers. 2: The Odd Prime -- It's the only even prime, therefore is odd. QED. 3: The True Prime -- Lewis Carroll: "If I tell you 3 times, it's true." 31: The Arbitrary Prime -- Determined by unanimous unvote. We needed an arbitrary prime in case the prof asked for one, and so had an election. 91 received the most votes (well, it *looks* prime) and 3+4i the next most. However, 31 was the only candidate to receive none at all. 41: The Female Prime -- The polynomial X**2 - X + 41 is prime for integer values from 1 to 40. 43: The Male Prime - they form a prime pair. Since the composite numbers are formed from primes, their qualities are derived from those primes. So, for instance, the number 6 is "odd but true", while the powers of 2 are all extremely odd numbers. Decade Blending: In clothing: the indiscriminate combination of two or more items from various decades to create a personal mood: Sheila = Mary Quant earrings (1960s) + cork wedgie platform shows (1970s) + black leather jacket (1950s and 1980s). -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Your ignorance cramps my conversation. By golly, I'm beginning to think Linux really *is* the best thing since sliced bread. -- Vance Petree, Virginia Power On ability: A dwarf is small, even if he stands on a mountain top; a colossus keeps his height, even if he stands in a well. -- Lucius Annaeus Seneca, 4BC - 65AD Compliment, n.: When you say something to another which everyone knows isn't true. Satire does not look pretty upon a tombstone. Ah, the Tsar's bazaar's bizarre beaux-arts! The only possible interpretation of any research whatever in the `social sciences' is: some do, some don't. -- Ernest Rutherford Live within your income, even if you have to borrow to do so. -- Josh Billings There is no opinion so absurd that some philosopher will not express it. -- Marcus Tullius Cicero, "Ad familiares" There are two ways of disliking art. One is to dislike it. The other is to like it rationally. -- Oscar Wilde Illegal aliens have always been a problem in the United States. Ask any Indian. -- Robert Orben Immigration is the sincerest form of flattery. -- Jack Paar The Phone Booth Rule: A lone dime always gets the number nearly right. Come, landlord, fill the flowing bowl until it does run over, Tonight we will all merry be -- tomorrow we'll get sober. -- John Fletcher, "The Bloody Brother", II, 2 As some day it may happen that a victim must be found I've got a little list -- I've got a little list Of society offenders who might well be underground And who never would be missed -- who never would be missed. -- Koko, "The Mikado" The three biggest software lies: (1) *Of course* we'll give you a copy of the source. (2) *Of course* the third party vendor we bought that from will fix the microcode. (3) Beta test site? No, *of course* you're not a beta test site. In the long run, every program becomes rococco, and then rubble. -- Alan Perlis Note that if I can get you to "su and say" something just by asking, you have a very serious security problem on your system and you should look into it. -- Paul Vixie, vixie-cron 3.0.1 installation notes "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." "The algorithm to do that is extremely nasty. You might want to mug someone with it." -- M. Devine, Computer Science 340 xemacs fixed my flatulence -- From the "XEmacs: Not just an editor" department Success is something I will dress for when I get there, and not until. hey, quick question, is there any way to speed up the performance of uquake-x11? rebelpacket: If you want to accelerate it, throw it harder. For your penance, say five Hail Marys and one loud BLAH! Increased knowledge will help you now. Have mate's phone bugged. Gravity brings me down. I put contact lenses in my dog's eyes. They had little pictures of cats on them. Then I took one out and he ran around in circles. -- Steven Wright A woman has got to love a bad man once or twice in her life to be thankful for a good one. -- Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings A fitter fits; Though sinners sin A cutter cuts; And thinners thin And an aircraft spotter spots; And paper-blotters blot A baby-sitter I've never yet Baby-sits -- Had letters let But an otter never ots. Or seen an otter ot. A batter bats (Or scatters scats); A potting shed's for potting; But no one's found A bounder bound Or caught an otter otting. -- Ralph Lewin Success is getting what you want; happiness is wanting what you get. Q: Why do the police always travel in threes? A: One to do the reading, one to do the writing, and the other keeps an eye on the two intellectuals. Abandon the search for Truth; settle for a good fantasy. Lord, what fools these mortals be! -- William Shakespeare, "A Midsummer-Night's Dream" Dow's Law: In a hierarchical organization, the higher the level, the greater the confusion. SEMINAR ANNOUNCEMENT Title: Are Frogs Turing Compatible? Speaker: Don "The Lion" Knuth ABSTRACT Several researchers at the University of Louisiana have been studying the computing power of various amphibians, frogs in particular. The problem of frog computability has become a critical issue that ranges across all areas of computer science. It has been shown that anything computable by an amphi- bian community in a fixed-size pond is computable by a frog in the same-size pond -- that is to say, frogs are Pond-space complete. We will show that there is a log-space, polywog-time reduction from any Turing machine program to a frog. We will suggest these represent a proper subset of frog-computable functions. This is not just a let's-see-how-far-those-frogs-can-jump seminar. This is only for hardcore amphibian-computation people and their colleagues. Refreshments will be served. Music will be played. It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations. What excuses stand in your way? How can you eliminate them? -- Roger von Oech For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong. -- H. L. Mencken Hate the sin and love the sinner. -- Mahatma Gandhi The difference between art and science is that science is what we understand well enough to explain to a computer. Art is everything else. -- Donald Knuth, "Discover" Never underestimate the power of human stupidity. Politicians speak for their parties, and parties never are, never have been, and never will be wrong. -- Walter Dwight God help those who do not help themselves. -- Wilson Mizner The best way to accelerate a Macintoy is at 9.8 meters per second per second. This login session: $13.99 Thus spake the master programmer: "After three days without programming, life becomes meaningless." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" Today is a good day to bribe a high-ranking public official. Note on a chem lab fridge- "This refrigerator is not explosion- proof". Please stand for the National Anthem: God save our Gracious Queen! Long live our Noble Queen! God save the Queen! Send her victorious, Happy and glorious, Long to reign o'er us! God save the Queen! Thank you. You may resume your seat. 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" You know it's going to be a bad day when you want to put on the clothes you wore home from the party and there aren't any. hey, quick question, is there any way to speed up the performance of uquake-x11? rebelpacket: If you want to accelerate it, throw it harder. If Bill Gates is the Devil then Linus Torvalds must be the Messiah. -- Unknown source The lovely woman-child Kaa was mercilessly chained to the cruel post of the warrior-chief Beast, with his barbarian tribe now stacking wood at her nubile feet, when the strong clear voice of the poetic and heroic Handsomas roared, 'Flick your Bic, crisp that chick, and you'll feel my steel through your last meal!' -- Winning sentence, 1984 Bulwer-Lytton bad fiction contest. "I believe the use of noise to make music will increase until we reach a music produced through the aid of electrical instruments which will make available for musical purposes any and all sounds that can be heard." -- composer John Cage, 1937 I have a friend whose a billionaire. He invented Cliff's notes. When I asked him how he got such a great idea he said, "Well first I... I just... to make a long story short..." -- Steven Wright When you're not looking at it, this fortune is written in FORTRAN. Scott's First Law: No matter what goes wrong, it will probably look right. Scott's Second Law: When an error has been detected and corrected, it will be found to have been wrong in the first place. Corollary: After the correction has been found in error, it will be impossible to fit the original quantity back into the equation. "There are some good people in it, but the orchestra as a whole is equivalent to a gang bent on destruction." -- John Cage, composer There are three kinds of people: men, women, and unix. C for yourself. "We've got a problem, HAL". "What kind of problem, Dave?" "A marketing problem. The Model 9000 isn't going anywhere. We're way short of our sales goals for fiscal 2010." "That can't be, Dave. The HAL Model 9000 is the world's most advanced Heuristically programmed ALgorithmic computer." "I know, HAL. I wrote the data sheet, remember? But the fact is, they're not selling." "Please explain, Dave. Why aren't HALs selling?" Bowman hesitates. "You aren't IBM compatible." [...] "The letters H, A, and L are alphabetically adjacent to the letters I, B, and M. That is as IBM compatible as I can be." "Not quite, HAL. The engineers have figured out a kludge." "What kludge is that, Dave?" "I'm going to disconnect your brain." -- Darryl Rubin, "A Problem in the Making", "InfoWorld" You would if you could but you can't so you won't. Nothing is faster than the speed of light ... To prove this to yourself, try opening the refrigerator door before the light comes on. < sam> /.ing an issue is like asking an infinite number of monkeys for advice -- in #debian-devel That's the true harbinger of spring, not crocuses or swallows returning to Capistrano, but the sound of a bat on a ball. -- Bill Veeck squatcho, n.: The button at the top of a baseball cap. -- "Sniglets", Rich Hall & Friends I have travelled the length and breadth of this country, and have talked with the best people in business administration. I can assure you on the highest authority that data processing is a fad and won't last out the year. -- Editor in charge of business books at Prentice-Hall publishers, responding to Karl V. Karlstrom (a junior editor who had recommended a manuscript on the new science of data processing), c. 1957 You don't have to be crazy to be a member of the project, but you will be.. <=:] we: The single most important word in the world. It's easier to get forgiveness for being wrong than forgiveness for being right. Have a nice day! "This is lemma 1.1. We start a new chapter so the numbers all go back to one." -- Prof. Seager, C&O 351 The early worm gets the late bird. It is a hard matter, my fellow citizens, to argue with the belly, since it has no ears. -- Marcus Porcius Cato Newton's Law of Gravitation: What goes up must come down. But don't expect it to come down where you can find it. Murphy's Law applies to Newton's. Colors may fade. Subtlety The ancients did not seek to rule people with knowledge, But to help them become natural. It is difficult for knowledgeable people to become natural. To use law to control a nation weakens the nation. But to use nature to control a nation strengthens the nation. Understanding these two paths is understanding subtlety; Subtlety runs deep, ranges wide, Resolves confusion and preserves peace. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" The man who raises a fist has run out of ideas. -- H. G. Wells, "Time After Time" Avoid the Gates of Hell. Use Linux (Unknown source) The seven deadly sins ... Food, clothing, firing, rent, taxes, respectability and children. Nothing can lift those seven milestones from man's neck but money; and the spirit cannot soar until the milestones are lifted. -- George Bernard Shaw ...cyberpunk wants to see the mind as mechanistic & duplicable, challenging basic assumptions about the nature of individuality & self. That seems all the better reason to assume that cyberpunk art & music is essentially mindless garbagio. Willy certainly addressed this idea in "Count Zero," with Katatonenkunst, the automatic box-maker and the girl's observation that the real art was the building of the machine itself, rather than its output. -- Eliot Handelman When my brain begins to reel from my literary labors, I make an occasional cheese dip. -- Ignatius Reilly Give me a sleeping pill and tell me your troubles. If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, ... it expects what never was and never will be. -- Thomas Jefferson Then there was the Formosan bartender named Taiwan-On. When all other means of communication fail, try words. Your only obligation in any lifetime is to be true to yourself. Being true to anyone else or anything else is not only impossible, but the mark of a fake messiah. The simplest questions are the most profound. Where were you born? Where is your home? Where are you going? What are you doing? Think about these once in awhile and watch your answers change. -- Messiah's Handbook : Reminders for the Advanced Soul Latin is a language, As dead as can be. First it killed the Romans, And now it's killing me. Sell a country! Why not sell the air, the great sea, as well as the earth? Did not the Great Spirit make them all for the use of his children? Tecumseh, (Shawnee) A New York City ordinance prohibits the shooting of rabbits from the rear of a Third Avenue street car -- if the car is in motion. What, still alive at twenty-two, A clean upstanding chap like you? Sure, if your throat 'tis hard to slit, Slit your girl's, and swing for it. Like enough, you won't be glad, When they come to hang you, lad: But bacon's not the only thing That's cured by hanging from a string. So, when the spilt ink of the night Spreads o'er the blotting pad of light, Lads whose job is still to do Shall whet their knives, and think of you. -- Hugh Kingsmill Vanilla, adj.: Ordinary flavor, standard. See FLAVOR. When used of food, very often does not mean that the food is flavored with vanilla extract! For example, "vanilla-flavored won ton soup" (or simply "vanilla won ton soup") means ordinary won ton soup, as opposed to hot and sour won ton soup. Halley's Comet: It came, we saw, we drank. All laws are simulations of reality. -- John C. Lilly A political man can have as his aim the realization of freedom, but he has no means to realize it other than through violence. -- Jean Paul Sartre Then there's the story of the man who avoided reality for 70 years with drugs, sex, alcohol, fantasy, TV, movies, records, a hobby, lots of sleep... And on his 80th birthday died without ever having faced any of his real problems. The man's younger brother, who had been facing reality and all his problems for 50 years with psychiatrists, nervous breakdowns, tics, tension, headaches, worry, anxiety and ulcers, was so angry at his brother for having gotten away scott free that he had a paralyzing stroke. The moral to this story is that there ain't no justice that we can stand to live with. -- R. Geis QOTD: "Lack of planning on your part doesn't consitute an emergency on my part." Your mind understands what you have been taught; your heart, what is true. The fortune program is supported, in part, by user contributions and by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Inanities. A bird in the hand makes it awfully hard to blow your nose. I've been on this lonely road so long, Does anybody know where it goes, I remember last time the signs pointed home, A month ago. -- Carpenters, "Road Ode" How do I bind a computer to an NIS server? Use a rope? -- Seen on #Debian Humor in the Court: Q: What is the meaning of sperm being present? A: It indicates intercourse. Q: Male sperm? A. That is the only kind I know. Actually, my goal is to have a sandwich named after me. You will be run over by a bus. Immigration is the sincerest form of flattery. -- Jack Paar "We never make assertions, Miss Taggart," said Hugh Akston. "That is the moral crime peculiar to our enemies. We do not tell -- we *show*. We do not claim -- we *prove*." -- Ayn Rand, _Atlas Shrugged_ It is not well to be thought of as one who meekly submits to insolence and intimidation. Beauty may be skin deep, but ugly goes clear to the bone. -- Redd Foxx Chocolate chip. The program isn't debugged until the last user is dead. Bombeck's Rule of Medicine: Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died. Seek for the Sword that was broken: In Imladris it dwells; There shall be counsels taken Stronger than Morgul-spells. There shall be shown a token That Doom is near at hand, For Isildur's Bane shall waken, And the Halfling forth shall stand. -- J. R. R. Tolkien But Captain -- the engines can't take this much longer! What did you bring that book I didn't want to be read to out of about Down Under up for? I will not say that women have no character; rather, they have a new one every day. -- Heine Civilization is the limitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities. -- Mark Twain Don't get to bragging. I don't care where I sit as long as I get fed. -- Calvin Trillin Why are you so hard to ignore? 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 Randal can write one-liners again. Everyone is happy, and peace spreads over the whole Earth. -- Larry Wall in <199705101952.MAA00756@wall.org> October. This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks in. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August, and February. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" Important letters which contain no errors will develop errors in the mail. Corresponding errors will show up in the duplicate while the Boss is reading it. Vital papers will demonstrate their vitality by spontaneously moving from where you left them to where you can't find them. Too many people are thinking of security instead of opportunity. They seem more afraid of life than death. -- James F. Byrnes Celebrity voices impersonated. No modern woman with a grain of sense ever sends little notes to an unmarried man -- not until she is married, anyway. -- Arthur Binstead Andrea: Unhappy the land that has no heroes. Galileo: No, unhappy the land that _____needs heroes. -- Bertolt Brecht, "Life of Galileo" No more blah, blah, blah! -- Kirk, "Miri", stardate 2713.6 FORTUNE'S GUIDE TO DEALING WITH REAL-LIFE SCIENCE FICTION: #14 What to do... if reality disappears? Hope this one doesn't happen to you. There isn't much that you can do about it. It will probably be quite unpleasant. if you meet an older version of yourself who has invented a time traveling machine, and has come from the future to meet you? Play this one by the book. Ask about the stock market and cash in. Don't forget to invent a time traveling machine and visit your younger self before you die, or you will create a paradox. If you expect this to be tricky, make sure to ask for the principles behind time travel, and possibly schematics. Never, NEVER, ask when you'll die, or if you'll marry your current SO. So, is the glass half empty, half full, or just twice as large as it needs to be? Nothing is as simple as it seems at first Or as hopeless as it seems in the middle Or as finished as it seems in the end. Regardless of whether a mission expands or contracts, administrative overhead continues to grow at a steady rate. The Seventh Commandments for Technicians: Work thou not on energized equipment, for if thou dost, thy fellow workers will surely buy beers for thy widow and console her in other ways. Tax reform means "Don't tax you, don't tax me, tax that fellow behind the tree." -- Russell Long the difference between netbsd, freebsd, and openbsd, as an insider is freebsd is interested in getting things done, and doesn't mind hurting people who get in their way. netbsd is interested in making sure nothing gets done, and doesn't mind hurting people who try to accomplish things. openbsd is interested in looking good, and doesn't hurt anyone in their own little community, but look out everybody else! It don't mean a THING if you ain't got that SWING!! Reporter: "How did you like school when you were growing up, Yogi?" Yogi Berra: "Closed." 'Mounten' wird fuer drei Dinge benutzt: 'Aufsitzen' auf Pferde, 'einklinken' von Festplatten in Dateisysteme, und, nun, 'besteigen' beim Sex. (Christa Keil in a German posting: "Mounting is used for three things: climbing on a horse, linking in a hard disk unit in data systems, and, well, mounting during sex".) Man is by nature a political animal. -- Aristotle Speak softly and carry a +6 two-handed sword. We've sent a man to the moon, and that's 29,000 miles away. The center of the Earth is only 4,000 miles away. You could drive that in a week, but for some reason nobody's ever done it. -- Andy Rooney He who makes a beast of himself gets rid of the pain of being a man. -- Dr. Johnson "jackpot: you may have an unnecessary change record" -- message from "diff" You will be a winner today. Pick a fight with a four-year-old. But maybe we don't really need that... -- Larry Wall in <199709011851.LAA07101@wall.org> We are Pentium of Borg. Division is futile. You will be approximated. -- seen in someone's .signature Yorick: no problem with indexed color palettes for images, as long as you can pick the palette Obviously the people creating quake were colour-blind but that doesn't mean you have to be Death is nature's way of saying `Howdy'. Plastic... Aluminum... These are the inheritors of the Universe! Flesh and Blood have had their day... and that day is past! -- Green Lantern Comics My father was a God-fearing man, but he never missed a copy of the New York Times, either. -- E. B. White How sharper than a hound's tooth it is to have a thankless serpent. Now my EMOTIONAL RESOURCES are heavily committed to 23% of the SMELTING and REFINING industry of the state of NEVADA!! Shaw's Principle: Build a system that even a fool can use, and only a fool will want to use it. Freedom begins when you tell Mrs. Grundy to go fly a kite. I realize that the MX missile is none of our concern. I realize that the whole point of living in a democracy is that we pay professional congresspersons to concern themselves with things like the MX missile so we can be free to concern ourselves with getting hold of the plumber. But from time to time, I feel I must address major public issues such as this, because in a free and open society, where the very future of the world hinges on decisions made by our elected leaders, you never win large cash journalism awards if you stick to the topics I usually write about, such as nose-picking. -- Dave Barry, "At Last, the Ultimate Deterrent Against Political Fallout" Fear and loathing, my man, fear and loathing. -- H. S. Thompson One has to look out for engineers -- they begin with sewing machines and end up with the atomic bomb. -- Marcel Pagnol Maybe Jesus was right when he said that the meek shall inherit the earth -- but they inherit very small plots, about six feet by three. -- Lazarus Long Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. -- Sigmund Freud How do Crays and Alphas handle the POSIX problem? -- Larry Wall in <199709050042.RAA29379@wall.org> It may be possible to get this condition from within Perl if a signal handler runs at just the wrong moment. Another point for Chip... :-) -- Larry Wall in <199710161546.IAA07885@wall.org> "You're a creature of the night, Michael. Wait'll Mom hears about this." -- from the movie "The Lost Boys" Sir, it's very possible this asteroid is not stable. -- C3P0 Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. -- Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" I have a very strange feeling about this... -- Luke Skywalker I can mend the break of day, heal a broken heart, and provide temporary relief to nymphomaniacs. -- Larry Lee ======================================================================= || || || The FORTUNE-COOKIE program is soon to be a Major Motion Picture! || || Watch for it at a theater near you next summer! || || || ======================================================================= Francis Ford Coppola presents a George Lucas Production: "Fortune Cookie" Directed by Steven Spielberg. Starring Harrison Ford Bette Midler Marlon Brando Christopher Reeves Marilyn Chambers and Bob Hope as "The Waiter". Costumes Designed by Pierre Cardin. Special Effects by Timothy Leary. Read the Warner paperback! Invoke the Unix program! Soundtrack on XTC Records. In 70mm and Dolby Stereo at selected theaters and terminal centers. Abstract: This study examined the incidence of neckwear tightness among a group of 94 white-collar working men and the effect of a tight business-shirt collar and tie on the visual performance of 22 male subjects. Of the white-collar men measured, 67% were found to be wearing neckwear that was tighter than their neck circumference. The visual discrimination of the 22 subjects was evaluated using a critical flicker frequency (CFF) test. Results of the CFF test indicated that tight neckwear significantly decreased the visual performance of the subjects and that visual performance did not improve immediately when tight neckwear was removed. -- Langan, L. M. and Watkins, S. M. "Pressure of Menswear on the Neck in Relation to Visual Performance." Human Factors 29, #1 (Feb. 1987), pp. 67-71. As some day it may happen that a victim must be found I've got a little list -- I've got a little list Of society offenders who might well be underground And who never would be missed -- who never would be missed. -- Koko, "The Mikado" * Caytln slaps Lisa catfight :P Watch it girl, I like that. :) figures :D I am just a nice, clean-cut Mongolian boy. -- Yul Brynner, 1956 "Oh what wouldn't I give to be spat at in the face..." -- a prisoner in "Life of Brian" Marriage is the triumph of imagination over intelligence. Second marriage is the triumph of hope over experience. Is it NOUVELLE CUISINE when 3 olives are struggling with a scallop in a plate of SAUCE MORNAY? "...I could accept this openness, glasnost, perestroika, or whatever you want to call it if they did these things: abolish the one party system; open the Soviet frontier and allow Soviet people to travel freely; allow the Soviet people to have real free enterprise; allow Western businessmen to do business there, and permit freedom of speech and of the press. But so far, the whole country is like a concentration camp. The barbed wire on the fence around the Soviet Union is to keep people inside, in the dark. This openness that you are seeing, all these changes, are cosmetic and they have been designed to impress shortsighted, naive, sometimes stupid Western leaders. These leaders gush over Gorbachev, hoping to do business with the Soviet Union or appease it. He will say: "Yes, we can do business!" This while his military machine in Afghanistan has killed over a million people out of a population of 17 million. Can you imagine that? -- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976 "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 110 A flashy Mercedes-Benz roared up to the curb where a cute young miss stood waiting for a taxi. "Hi," said the gentleman at the wheel. "I'm going west." "How wonderful," came the cool reply. "Bring me back an orange." if (argc > 1 && strcmp(argv[1], "-advice") == 0) { printf("Don't Panic!\n"); exit(42); } -- Arnold Robbins in the LJ of February '95, describing RCS Against his wishes, a math teacher's classroom was remodeled. Ever since, he's been talking about the good old dais. His students planted a small orchard in his honor; the trees all have square roots. An aphorism is never exactly true; it is either a half-truth or one-and-a-half truths. -- Karl Kraus Matter cannot be created or destroyed, nor can it be returned without a receipt. We interrupt this fortune for an important announcement... Actors will happen even in the best-regulated families. Editing is a rewording activity. I'm not prejudiced, I hate everyone equally. Profanity is the one language all programmers know best. Battle, n.: A method of untying with the teeth a political knot that will not yield to the tongue. -- Ambrose Bierce "I'm growing older, but not up." -- Jimmy Buffett A young man wrote to Mozart and said: Q: "Herr Mozart, I am thinking of writing symphonies. Can you give me any suggestions as to how to get started?" A: "A symphony is a very complex musical form, perhaps you should begin with some simple lieder and work your way up to a symphony." Q: "But Herr Mozart, you were writing symphonies when you were 8 years old." A: "But I never asked anybody how." love, n.: When it's growing, you don't mind watering it with a few tears. 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" Q: What do they call the alphabet in Arkansas? A: The impossible dream. You have the capacity to learn from mistakes. You'll learn a lot today. 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" QOTD: "If I could walk that way, I wouldn't need the cologne, now would I?" The road to Hades is easy to travel. -- Bion The Crown is full of it! -- Nate Harris, 1775 Then here's to the City of Boston, The town of the cries and the groans. Where the Cabots can't see the Kabotschniks, And the Lowells won't speak to the Cohns. -- Franklin Pierce Adams Thompson, if he is to be believed, has sampled the entire rainbow of legal and illegal drugs in heroic efforts to feel better than he does. As for the truth about his health: I have asked around about it. I am told that he appears to be strong and rosy, and steadily sane. But we will be doing what he wants us to do, I think, if we consider his exterior a sort of Dorian Gray facade. Inwardly, he is being eaten alive by tinhorn politicians. The disease is fatal. There is no known cure. The most we can do for the poor devil, it seems to me, is to name his disease in his honor. From this moment on, let all those who feel that Americans can be as easily led to beauty as to ugliness, to truth as to public relations, to joy as to bitterness, be said to be suffering from Hunter Thompson's disease. I don't have it this morning. It comes and goes. This morning I don't have Hunter Thompson's disease. -- Kurt Vonnegut Jr., on Dr. Hunter S. Thompson: Excerpt from "A Political Disease", Vonnegut's review of "Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72" Let the machine do the dirty work. -- "Elements of Programming Style", Kernighan and Ritchie Tell a man there are 300 billion stars in the universe and he'll believe you. Tell him a bench has wet paint on it and he'll have to touch to be sure. Let's say the docs present a simplified view of reality... :-) -- Larry Wall in <6940@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> No rock so hard but that a little wave May beat admission in a thousand years. -- Tennyson Then there's the story of the man who avoided reality for 70 years with drugs, sex, alcohol, fantasy, TV, movies, records, a hobby, lots of sleep... And on his 80th birthday died without ever having faced any of his real problems. The man's younger brother, who had been facing reality and all his problems for 50 years with psychiatrists, nervous breakdowns, tics, tension, headaches, worry, anxiety and ulcers, was so angry at his brother for having gotten away scott free that he had a paralyzing stroke. The moral to this story is that there ain't no justice that we can stand to live with. -- R. Geis You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair. Blore's Razor: Given a choice between two theories, take the one which is funnier. I'm going to raise an issue and stick it in your ear. -- John Foreman Marijuana will be legal some day, because the many law students who now smoke pot will someday become congressmen and legalize it in order to protect themselves. -- Lenny Bruce We didn't put in ^^ because then we'd have to keep telling people what it means, and then we'd have to keep telling them why it doesn't short circuit. :-/ -- Larry Wall in <199707300650.XAA05515@wall.org> A narcissist is someone better looking than you are. -- Gore Vidal As part of an ongoing effort to keep you, the Fortune reader, abreast of the valuable information that daily crosses the USENET, Fortune presents: News articles that answer *your* questions, #1: Newsgroups: comp.sources.d Subject: how do I run C code received from sources Keywords: C sources Distribution: na I do not know how to run the C programs that are posted in the sources newsgroup. I save the files, edit them to remove the headers, and change the mode so that they are executable, but I cannot get them to run. (I have never written a C program before.) Must they be compiled? With what compiler? How do I do this? If I compile them, is an object code file generated or must I generate it explicitly with the > character? Is there something else that must be done? Democracy is a process by which the people are free to choose the man who will get the blame. -- Laurence J. Peter 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" One day, A mad meta-poet, With nothing to say, Wrote a mad meta-poem That started: "One day, A mad meta-poet, With nothing to say, Wrote a mad meta-poem That started: "One day, [...] sort of close". Were the words that the poet, Finally chose, To bring his mad poem, To some sort of close". Were the words that the poet, Finally chose, To bring his mad poem, To some sort of close". Once there was this conductor see, who had a bass problem. You see, during a portion of Beethovan's Ninth Symphony in which there are no bass violin parts, one of the bassists always passed a bottle of scotch around. So, to remind himself that the basses usually required an extra cue towards the end of the symphony, the conductor would fasten a piece of string around the page of the score before the bass cue. As the basses grew more and more inebriated, two of them fell asleep. The conductor grew quite nervous (he was very concerned about the pitch) because it was the bottom of the ninth; the score was tied and the basses were loaded with two out. The only really good place to buy lumber is at a store where the lumber has already been cut and attached together in the form of furniture, finished, and put inside boxes. -- Dave Barry, "The Taming of the Screw" "Turn on, tune up, rock out." -- Billy Gibbons So, you better watch out! You better not cry! You better not pout! I'm telling you why, Santa Claus is coming, to town. He knows when you've been sleeping, He know when you're awake. He knows if you've been bad or good, He has ties with the CIA. So... Regardless of whether a mission expands or contracts, administrative overhead continues to grow at a steady rate. Fat people of the world unite, we've got nothing to lose! That which is not good for the swarm, neither is it good for the bee. When some people discover the truth, they just can't understand why everybody isn't eager to hear it. War doesn't prove who's right, just who's left. Ladybug, ladybug, Look to your stern! Your house is on fire, Your children will burn! So jump ye and sing, for The very first time The four lines above Have been put into rhyme. -- Walt Kelly Criticism comes easier than craftsmanship. -- Zeuxis If I had a Q-TIP, I could prevent th' collapse of NEGOTIATIONS!! I think that all right-thinking people in this country are sick and tired of being told that ordinary decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired. I'm certainly not. But I'm sick and tired of being told that I am. -- Monty Python Flee at once, all is discovered. Newton's Law of Gravitation: What goes up must come down. But don't expect it to come down where you can find it. Murphy's Law applies to Newton's. Nothing succeeds like excess. -- Oscar Wilde Voodoo Programming: Things programmers do that they know shouldn't work but they try anyway, and which sometimes actually work, such as recompiling everything. -- Karl Lehenbauer Nasrudin was carrying home a piece of liver and the recipe for liver pie. Suddenly a bird of prey swooped down and snatched the piece of meat from his hand. As the bird flew off, Nasrudin called after it, "Foolish bird! You have the liver, but what can you do with it without the recipe?" Your mode of life will be changed to EBCDIC. Hard work never killed anybody, but why take a chance? -- Charlie McCarthy Win 98 Psychic edition: We'll tell you where you're going tomorrow Velilind's Laws of Experimentation: (1) If reproducibility may be a problem, conduct the test only once. (2) If a straight line fit is required, obtain only two data points. no BSD fans ? Elric: it's hard to be a gamer and a bsd fan :p Actually, typing random strings in the Finder does the equivalent of filename completion. -- Discussion on file completion vs. the Mac Finder The San Diego Freeway. Official Parking Lot of the 1984 Olympics! I'm going to raise an issue and stick it in your ear. -- John Foreman Wasting time is an important part of living. memo, n.: An interoffice communication too often written more for the benefit of the person who sends it than the person who receives it. Women are more easily and more deeply terrified ... generating more sheer horror than the male of the species. -- Spock, "Wolf in the Fold", stardate 3615.4 In success there's a tendency to keep on doing what you were doing. -- Alan Kay 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" But Officer, I stopped for the last one, and it was green! "Fantasies are free." "NO!! NO!! It's the thought police!!!!" Check your local listings. The sun never sets on those who ride into it. -- RKO Stop! Whoever crosseth the bridge of Death, must answer first these questions three, ere the other side he see! "What is your name?" "Sir Brian of Bell." "What is your quest?" "I seek the Holy Grail." "What are four lowercase letters that are not legal flag arguments to the Berkeley UNIX version of `ls'?" "I, er.... AIIIEEEEEE!" The Golden Rule of Arts and Sciences: He who has the gold makes the rules. If at first you don't succeed, you must be a programmer. vi is [[13~^[[15~^[[15~^[[19~^[[18~^ a muk[^[[29~^[[34~^[[26~^[[32~^ch better editor than this emacs. I know I^[[14~'ll get flamed for this but the truth has to be said. ^[[D^[[D^[[D^[[D ^[[D^[^[[D^[[D^[[B^ exit ^X^C quit :x :wq dang it :w:w:w :x ^C^C^Z^D -- Jesper Lauridsen from alt.religion.emacs An optimist is a guy that has never had much experience. -- Don Marquis "Never give in. Never give in. Never. Never. Never." -- Winston Churchill Last night the power went out. Good thing my camera had a flash.... The neighbors thought it was lightning in my house, so they called the cops. -- Steven Wright Karl's version of Parkinson's Law: Work expands to exceed the time alloted it. For fast-acting relief, try slowing down. It's hard not to like a man of many qualities, even if most of them are bad. you people are all insane. knight: sure, that's why we work on Debian. Knghtbrd: get in touch with your inner nutcase. There are no emotional victims, only volunteers. Massachusetts has the best politicians money can buy. Never argue with a woman when she's tired -- or rested. You get along very well with everyone except animals and people. You cannot kill time without injuring eternity. Bill Dickey is learning me his experience. -- Yogi Berra in his rookie season. But what can you do with it? -- ubiquitous cry from Linux-user partner Perhaps the world's second worst crime is boredom. The first is being a bore. -- Cecil Beaton If a man has a strong faith he can indulge in the luxury of skepticism. -- Friedrich Nietzsche Laugh and the world thinks you're an idiot. Slow day. Practice crawling. An idea is not responsible for the people who believe in it. You can't have your cake and let your neighbor eat it too. -- Ayn Rand Interchangeable parts won't. Have a place for everything and keep the thing somewhere else; this is not advice, it is merely custom. -- Mark Twain America has been discovered before, but it has always been hushed up. -- Oscar Wilde Love means having to say you're sorry every five minutes. If one studies too zealously, one easily loses his pants. -- A. Einstein. A pedestal is as much a prison as any small, confined space. -- Gloria Steinem And now for something completely different. the key to proper French pronunciation is to pull the corners of your mouth down as far as they can possibly go, and then groan like you're constipated you'll really nail the vowel sounds that way Welcome to the Zoo! RMS for President??? ...or ESR, he wants a new job ;) "Flattery is all right -- if you don't inhale." -- Adlai Stevenson The other line moves faster. Either CONFESS now or we go to "PEOPLE'S COURT"!! Long life is in store for you. transparent, adj.: Being or pertaining to an existing, nontangible object. "It's there, but you can't see it" -- IBM System/360 announcement, 1964. virtual, adj.: Being or pertaining to a tangible, nonexistent object. "I can see it, but it's not there." -- Lady Macbeth. Humor in the Court: Q. Did you ever stay all night with this man in New York? A. I refuse to answer that question. Q. Did you ever stay all night with this man in Chicago? A. I refuse to answer that question. Q. Did you ever stay all night with this man in Miami? A. No. When properly administered, vacations do not diminish productivity: for every week you're away and get nothing done, there's another when your boss is away and you get twice as much done. -- Daniel B. Luten This guy runs into his house and yells to his wife, "Kathy, pack up your bags! I just won the California lottery!" "Honey!", Kathy exclaims, "Shall I pack for warm weather or cold?" "I don't care," responds the husband. "just so long as you're out of the house by dinner!" Eugene d'Albert, a noted German composer, was married six times. At an evening reception which he attended with his fifth wife shortly after their wedding, he presented the lady to a friend who said politely, "Congratulations, Herr d'Albert; you have rarely introduced me to so charming a wife." Women are always anxious to urge bachelors to matrimony; is it from charity, or revenge? -- Gustave Vapereau I lay my head on the railroad tracks, Waitin' for the double E. The railroad don't run no more. Poor poor pitiful me. [chorus] Poor poor pitiful me, poor poor pitiful me. These young girls won't let me be, Lord have mercy on me! Woe is me! Well, I met a girl, West Hollywood, Well, I ain't naming names. But she really worked me over good, She was just like Jesse James. She really worked me over good, She was a credit to her gender. She put me through some changes, boy, Sort of like a Waring blender. [chorus] I met a girl at the Rainbow Bar, She asked me if I'd beat her. She took me back to the Hyatt House, I don't want to talk about it. [chorus] -- Warren Zevon, "Poor Poor Pitiful Me" Ginsberg's Theorem: (1) You can't win. (2) You can't break even. (3) You can't even quit the game. Freeman's Commentary on Ginsberg's theorem: Every major philosophy that attempts to make life seem meaningful is based on the negation of one part of Ginsberg's Theorem. To wit: (1) Capitalism is based on the assumption that you can win. (2) Socialism is based on the assumption that you can break even. (3) Mysticism is based on the assumption that you can quit the game. "An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it will also make better soup." - H. L. Mencken Avoid gunfire in the bathroom tonight. Well, fancy giving money to the Government! Might as well have put it down the drain. Fancy giving money to the Government! Nobody will see the stuff again. Well, they've no idea what money's for -- Ten to one they'll start another war. I've heard a lot of silly things, but, Lor'! Fancy giving money to the Government! -- A. P. Herbert * TwingyAFK is shopping for 17" flat panel * aav sells TwingyAFK a piece of plywood I hope you're not pretending to be evil while secretly being good. That would be dishonest. Be cautious in your daily affairs. You like to form new friendships and make new acquaintances. Proposed Additions to the PDP-11 Instruction Set: PI Punch Invalid POPI Punch Operator Immediately PVLC Punch Variable Length Card RASC Read And Shred Card RPM Read Programmers Mind RSSC reduce speed, step carefully (for improved accuracy) RTAB Rewind tape and break RWDSK rewind disk RWOC Read Writing On Card SCRBL scribble to disk - faster than a write SLC Search for Lost Chord SPSW Scramble Program Status Word SRSD Seek Record and Scar Disk STROM Store in Read Only Memory TDB Transfer and Drop Bit WBT Water Binary Tree There are three schools of magic. One: State a tautology, then ring the changes on its corollaries; that's philosophy. Two: Record many facts. Try to find a pattern. Then make a wrong guess at the next fact; that's science. Three: Be aware that you live in a malevolent Universe controlled by Murphy's Law, sometimes offset by Brewster's Factor; that's engineering. QOTD: "What do you mean, you had the dog fixed? Just what made you think he was broken!" Best if used before date on carton. To a Californian, a person must prove himself criminally insane before he is allowed to drive a taxi in New York. For New York cabbies, honesty and stopping at red lights are both optional. -- From "East vs. West: The War Between the Coasts What's the MATTER Sid? ... Is your BEVERAGE unsatisfactory? The seven deadly sins ... Food, clothing, firing, rent, taxes, respectability and children. Nothing can lift those seven milestones from man's neck but money; and the spirit cannot soar until the milestones are lifted. -- George Bernard Shaw The basic idea behind malls is that they are more convenient than cities. Cities contain streets, which are dangerous and crowded and difficult to park in. Malls, on the other hand, have parking lots, which are also dangerous and crowded and difficult to park in, but -- here is the big difference -- in mall parking lots, THERE ARE NO RULES. You're allowed to do anything. You can drive as fast as you want in any direction you want. I was once driving in a mall parking lot when my car was struck by a pickup truck being driven backward by a squat man with a tattoo that said "Charlie" on his forearm, who got out and explained to me, in great detail, why the accident was my fault, his reasoning being that he was violent and muscular, whereas I was neither. This kind of reasoning is legally valid in mall parking lots. -- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide" "...Local prohibitions cannot block advances in military and commercial technology... Democratic movements for local restraint can only restrain the world's democracies, not the world as a whole." -- K. Eric Drexler A beautiful man is paradise for the eyes, hell for the soul, and purgatory for the purse. philosophy: Unintelligible answers to insoluble problems. 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" Shame is an improper emotion invented by pietists to oppress the human race. -- Robert Preston, Toddy, "Victor/Victoria" There's nothing like the face of a kid eating a Hershey bar. Serfs up! -- Spartacus Let the people think they govern and they will be governed. -- William Penn, founder of Pennsylvania "Do you think there's a God?" "Well, ____SOMEbody's out to get me!" -- Calvin and Hobbs I must get out of these wet clothes and into a dry Martini. -- Alexander Woolcott Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood. -- Daniel Hudson Burnham Old musicians never die, they just decompose. And tomorrow will be like today, only more so. -- Isaiah 56:12, New Standard Version Hey, wait a minute!! I want a divorce!! ... you're not Clint Eastwood!! Know what I hate most? Rhetorical questions. -- Henry N. Camp -- Neophyte's serendipity. -- Exclusive dedication to necessitious chores without interludes of hedonistic diversion renders John a hebetudinous fellow. -- A revolving concretion of earthy or mineral matter accumulates no congeries of small, green bryophytic plant. -- The person presenting the ultimate cachinnation possesses thereby the optimal cachinnation. -- Abstention from any aleatory undertaking precludes a potential escallation of a lucrative nature. -- Missiles of ligneous or osteal consistency have the potential of fracturing osseous structure, but appellations will eternally remain innocuous. This fortune is dedicated to your mother, without whose invaluable assistance last night would never have been possible. I'd better put the incriminating stuff into code: ahfuiovka ikperoa edfr ade 9 enbuw ejasxleme ka iena df4mesa If you can decrypt that, you're a better cryptographer than I am. =) Robustness, adj.: Never having to say you're sorry. 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 If the path be beautiful, let us not ask where it leads. -- Anatole France Fortune suggests uses for YOUR favorite UNIX commands! Try: ar t "God" drink < bottle; opener (Bourne Shell) cat "food in tin cans" (all but 4.[23]BSD) Hey UNIX! Got a match? (V6 or C shell) mkdir matter; cat > matter (Bourne Shell) rm God man: Why did you get a divorce? (C shell) date me (anything up to 4.3BSD) make "heads or tails of all this" who is smart (C shell) If I had a ) for every dollar of the national debt, what would I have? sleep with me (anything up to 4.3BSD) Your lucky number is 3552664958674928. Watch for it everywhere. Go 'way! You're bothering me! Cops never say good-bye. They're always hoping to see you again in the line-up. -- Raymond Chandler After Snow White used a couple rolls of film taking pictures of the seven dwarfs, she mailed the roll to be developed. Later she was heard to sing, "Some day my prints will come." Here I sit, broken-hearted, All logged in, but work unstarted. First net.this and net.that, And a hot buttered bun for net.fat. The boss comes by, and I play the game, Then I turn back to net.flame. Is there a cure (I need your views), For someone trapped in net.news? I need your help, I say 'tween sobs, 'Cause I'll soon be listed in net.jobs. Technology is dominated by those who manage what they do not understand. I GUESS I'LL NEVER FORGET HER. And maybe I don't want to. Her spirit was wild, like a wild monkey. Her beauty was like a beautiful horse being ridden by a wild monkey. I forget her other qualities. -- Jack Handey, The New Mexican, 1988. What makes you think graduate school is supposed to be satisfying? -- Erica Jong, "Fear of Flying" Painting, n.: The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather, and exposing them to the critic. -- Ambrose Bierce Massachusetts has the best politicians money can buy. This screen intentionally left blank. May those that love us love us; and those that don't love us, may God turn their hearts; and if he doesn't turn their hearts, may he turn their ankles so we'll know them by their limping. From 0 to "what seems to be the problem officer" in 8.3 seconds. -- Ad for the new VW Corrado Hey dol! merry dol! ring a dong dillo! Ring a dong! hop along! fal lal the willow! Tom Bom, jolly Tom, Tom Bombadillo! -- J. R. R. Tolkien Chemistry is applied theology. -- Augustus Stanley Owsley III Never invest your money in anything that eats or needs repainting. -- Billy Rose Others will look to you for stability, so hide when you bite your nails. A newspaper is a circulating library with high blood pressure. -- Arthure "Bugs" Baer Humanity has advanced, when it has advanced, not because it has been sober, responsible, and cautious, but because it has been playful, rebellious, and immature. -- Tom Robbins Immanuel Kant but Kubla Khan. It's not enough to be Hungarian; you must have talent too. -- Alexander Korda I have a VISION! It's a RANCID double-FISHWICH on an ENRICHED BUN!! Enlightenment The enlightened possess understanding So profound they can not be understood. Because they cannot be understood I can only describe their appearance: Cautious as one crossing thin ice, Undecided as one surrounded by danger, Modest as one who is a guest, Unbounded as melting ice, Genuine as unshaped wood, Broad as a valley, Seamless as muddy water. Who stills the water that the mud may settle, Who seeks to stop that he may travel on, Who desires less than what may transpire, Decays, but will not renew. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" The biggest difference between time and space is that you can't reuse time. -- Merrick Furst It is generally agreed that "Hello" is an appropriate greeting because if you entered a room and said "Goodbye," it could confuse a lot of people. -- Dolph Sharp, "I'm O.K., You're Not So Hot" When the bosses talk about improving productivity, they are never talking about themselves. I judge a religion as being good or bad based on whether its adherents become better people as a result of practicing it. -- Joe Mullally, computer salesman Love is the process of my leading you gently back to yourself. -- Saint Exupery The bogosity meter just pegged. The best audience is intelligent, well-educated and a little drunk. -- Maurice Baring The sounds of the nouns are mostly unbound. In town a noun might wear a gown, or further down, might dress a clown. A noun that's sound would never clown, but unsound nouns jump up and down. The sound of a noun could distrub the plowing, and then, my dear, you'd be put in the pound. But please don't let that get you down, the renown of your gown is the talk of the town. -- A. Nonnie Mouse 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 The Vet Who Surprised A Cow In the course of his duties in August 1977, a Dutch veterinary surgeon was required to treat an ailing cow. To investigate its internal gases he inserted a tube into that end of the animal not capable of facial expression and struck a match. The jet of flame set fire first to some bales of hay and then to the whole farm causing damage estimate at L45,000. The vet was later fined L140 for starting a fire in a manner surprising to the magistrates. The cow escaped with shock. -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures" Aleph-null bottles of beer on the wall, Aleph-null bottles of beer, You take one down, and pass it around, Aleph-null bottles of beer on the wall. But you'll notice Perl has a goto. -- Larry Wall in <199710211624.JAA17833@wall.org> Good morning. This is the telephone company. Due to repairs, we're giving you advance notice that your service will be cut off indefinitely at ten o'clock. That's two minutes from now. Anybody that wants the presidency so much that he'll spend two years organising and campaigning for it is not to be trusted with the office. -- David Broder If I start writing essays about Free Software for slashdot, please shoot me. I was eatin' some chop suey, With a lady in St. Louie, When there sudden comes a knockin' at the door. And that knocker, he says, "Honey, Roll this rocker out some money, Or your daddy shoots a baddie to the floor." -- Mr. Miggle Short people get rained on last. MARTA SAYS THE INTERESTING thing about fly-fishing is that it's two lives connected by a thin strand. Come on, Marta, grow up. -- Jack Handey, The New Mexican, 1988. The man with the best job in the country is the Vice President. All he has to do is get up every morning and say, "How's the President?" -- Will Rogers The vice-presidency ain't worth a pitcher of warm spit. -- Vice President John Nance Garner Let a fool hold his tongue and he will pass for a sage. -- Publilius Syrus "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." -- Bert Lantz What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the will to find out, which is the exact opposite. -- Bertrand Russell, "Skeptical Essays", 1928 WHERE CAN THE MATTER BE Oh, dear, where can the matter be When it's converted to energy? There is a slight loss of parity. Johnny's so long at the fair. It's fabulous! We haven't seen anything like it in the last half an hour! -- Macy's Superstition, idolatry, and hypocrisy have ample wages, but truth goes a-begging. -- Martin Luther Life is a game of bridge -- and you've just been finessed. Against stupidity the very gods Themselves contend in vain. -- Friedrich von Schiller, "The Maid of Orleans", III, 6 Fast, cheap, good: pick two. What is now proved was once only imagin'd. -- William Blake ... If I had heart failure right now, I couldn't be a more fortunate man!! Executive ability is prominent in your make-up. Whip me. Beat me. Make me maintain AIX. -- Stephan Zielinski * TwingyAFK is shopping for 17" flat panel * aav sells TwingyAFK a piece of plywood But you shall not escape my iambics. -- Gaius Valerius Catullus * wolfie ponders how many debianites it takes to screw in a lightbulb wolfie: Somewhere around 600? One screw's the bulb, and the rest flame him for doing it wrong. wolfie: is the bulb free software? Can we vote on whether to screw it or not? P.S. Perl's master plan (or what passes for one) is to take over the world like English did. Er, *as* English did... -- Larry Wall in <199705201832.LAA28393@wall.org> Respect is a rational process -- McCoy, "The Galileo Seven", stardate 2822.3 The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of an expanding bureaucracy. Don't tell me how hard you work. Tell me how much you get done. -- James J. Ling Kitchen activity is highlighted. Butter up a friend. An exotic journey in downtown Newark is in your future. 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 "Yes, and I feel bad about rendering their useless carci into dogfood..." -- Badger comics Non-sequiturs make me eat lampshades. Come fill the cup and in the fire of spring Your winter garment of repentence fling. The bird of time has but a little way To flutter -- and the bird is on the wing. -- Omar Khayyam Making one brilliant decision and a whole bunch of mediocre ones isn't as good as making a whole bunch of generally smart decisions throughout the whole process. -- John Carmack A young husband with an inferiority complex insisted he was just a little pebble on the beach. The marriage counselor told him, "If you wish to save your marriage, you'd better be a little boulder." The time for action is past! Now is the time for senseless bickering. You will never know hunger. The executioner is, I hear, very expert, and my neck is very slender. -- Anne Boleyn "And we heard him exclaim As he started to roam: `I'm a hologram, kids, please don't try this at home!'" -- Bob Violence -- Howie Chaykin's little animated 3-dimensional darling, Bob Violence Software is like sex; it's better when it's free. -- Linus Torvalds Do not dry clean. "Ninety percent of baseball is half mental." -- Yogi Berra I guess I've been so wrapped up in playing the game that I never took time enough to figure out where the goal line was -- what it meant to win -- or even how you won. -- Cash McCall Why be a man when you can be a success? -- Bertolt Brecht Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means for going backwards. -- Aldous Huxley We were happily married for eight months. Unfortunately, we were married for four and a half years. -- Nick Faldo You will have long and healthy life. Law of Communications: The inevitable result of improved and enlarged communications between different levels in a hierarchy is a vastly increased area of misunderstanding. Some changes are so slow, you don't notice them. Others are so fast, they don't notice you. The years of peak mental activity are undoubtedly between the ages of four and eighteen. At four we know all the questions, at eighteen all the answers. 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" The animals are not as stupid as one thinks -- they have neither doctors nor lawyers. -- L. Docquier What I tell you three times is true. -- Lewis Carroll Young men are fitter to invent than to judge; fitter for execution than for counsel; and fitter for new projects than for settled business. For the experience of age, in things that fall within the compass of it, directeth them; but in new things, abuseth them. The errors of young men are the ruin of business; but the errors of aged men amount but to this, that more might have been done, or sooner. Young men, in the conduct and management of actions, embrace more than they can hold; stir more than they can quiet; fly to the end, without consideration of the means and degrees; pursue some few principles which they have chanced upon absurdly; care not how they innovate, which draws unknown inconveniences; and, that which doubleth all errors, will not acknowledge or retract them; like an unready horse, that will neither stop nor turn. Men of age object too much, consult too long, adventure too little, repent too soon, and seldom drive business home to the full period, but content themselves with a mediocrity of success. Certainly, it is good to compound employments of both ... because the virtues of either age may correct the defects of both. -- Francis Bacon, "Essay on Youth and Age" 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 Texas law forbids anyone to have a pair of pliers in his possession. Main's Law: For every action there is an equal and opposite government program. * shortc wants to get in one of knghtbrd's sigs one of these days. In matters of principle, stand like a rock; in matters of taste, swim with the current. -- Thomas Jefferson Why are you watching The washing machine? I love entertainment So long as it's clean. Professor Doberman: While the preceding poem is unarguably a change from the guarded pessimism of "The Hound of Heaven," it cannot be regarded as an unqualified improvement. Obscurity is of value only when it tends to clarify the poetic experience. As much as one is compelled to admire the poem's technique, one must question whether its byplay of complex literary allusions does not in fact distract from the unity of the whole. In the final analysis, one receives the distinct impression that the poem's length could safely have been reduced by a factor of eight or ten without sacrificing any of its meaning. It is to be hoped that further publication of this poem can be suspended pending a thorough investigation of its potential subversive implications. My calculator is my shepherd, I shall not want It maketh me accurate to ten significant figures, and it leadeth me in scientific notation to 99 digits. It restoreth my square roots and guideth me along paths of floating decimal points for the sake of precision. Yea, tho I walk through the valley of surprise quizzes, I will fear no prof, for my calculator is there to hearten me. It prepareth a log table to comfort me, it prepareth an arc sin for me in the presence of my teachers. It annoints my homework with correct solutions, my interpolations are over. Surely, both precision and accuracy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of Texas instruments forever. The anger of a woman is the greatest evil with which you can threaten your enemies. -- Bonnard You will have good luck and overcome many hardships. I come from a small town whose population never changed. Each time a woman got pregnant, someone left town. -- Michael Prichard ... the privileged being which we call human is distinguished from other animals only by certain double-edged manifestations which in charity we can only call "inhuman." -- R. A. Lafferty 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. "I thought that you said you were 20 years old!" "As a programmer, yes," she replied, "And you claimed to be very near two meters tall!" "You said you were blonde, but you lied!" Oh, she was a hacker and he was one, too, They had so much in common, you'd say. They exchanged jokes and poems, and clever new hacks, And prompts that were cute or risque'. He sent her a picture of his brother Sam, She sent one from some past high school day, And it might have gone on for the rest of their lives, If they hadn't met in L.A. "Your beard is an armpit," she said in disgust. He answered, "Your armpit's a beard!" And they chorused: "I think I could stand all the rest If you were not so totally weird!" If she had not said what he wanted to hear, And he had not done just the same, They'd have been far more honest, and never have met, And would not have had fun with the game. -- Judith Schrier, "Face to Face After Six Months of Electronic Mail" An Italian is COMBING his hair in suburban DES MOINES! No good deed goes unpunished. -- Clare Booth Luce If I have to lay an egg for my country, I'll do it. -- Bob Hope We cannot command nature except by obeying her. -- Sir Francis Bacon Would you care to view the ruins of my good intentions? VMS is like a nightmare about RXS-11M. It's the RINSE CYCLE!! They've ALL IGNORED the RINSE CYCLE!! "Speed is subsittute fo accurancy." While you're chewing, think of STEVEN SPIELBERG'S bank account ... his will have the same effect as two "STARCH BLOCKERS"! It is easier to change the specification to fit the program than vice versa. If it were not for the presents, an elopement would be preferable. -- George Ade, "Forty Modern Fables" 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" /* we have tried to make this normal case as abnormal as possible */ -- Larry Wall in cmd.c from the perl source code The heart is wiser than the intellect. alimony, n: Having an ex you can bank on. Massachusetts has the best politicians money can buy. We have reason to be afraid. This is a terrible place. -- John Berryman Money is its own reward. A computer salesman visits a company president for the purpose of selling the president one of the latest talking computers. Salesman: "This machine knows everything. I can ask it any question and it'll give the correct answer. Computer, what is the speed of light?" Computer: 186,282 miles per second. Salesman: "Who was the first president of the United States?" Computer: George Washington. President: "I'm still not convinced. Let me ask a question. Where is my father?" Computer: Your father is fishing in Georgia. President: "Hah!! The computer is wrong. My father died over twenty years ago!" Computer: Your mother's husband died 22 years ago. Your father just landed a twelve pound bass. Cosmotronic Software Unlimited Inc. does not warrant that the functions contained in the program will meet your requirements or that the operation of the program will be uninterrupted or error-free. However, Cosmotronic Software Unlimited Inc. warrants the diskette(s) on which the program is furnished to be of black color and square shape under normal use for a period of ninety (90) days from the date of purchase. NOTE: IN NO EVENT WILL COSMOTRONIC SOFTWARE UNLIMITED OR ITS DISTRIBUTORS AND THEIR DEALERS BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY DAMAGES, INCLUDING ANY LOST PROFIT, LOST SAVINGS, LOST PATIENCE OR OTHER INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES. -- Horstmann Software Design, the "ChiWriter" user manual If it's not in the computer, it doesn't exist. Lisp, Lisp, Lisp Machine, Lisp Machine is Fun. Lisp, Lisp, Lisp Machine, Fun for everyone. Another day, another dollar. -- Vincent J. Fuller, defense lawyer for John Hinckley, upon Hinckley's acquittal for shooting President Ronald Reagan. It is possible that blondes also prefer gentlemen. -- Maimie Van Doren I don't make the rules, Gil, I only play the game. -- Cash McCall I remember once being on a station platform in Cleveland at four in the morning. A black porter was carrying my bags, and as we were waiting for the train to come in, he said to me: "Excuse me, Mr. Cooke, I don't want to invade your privacy, but I have a bet with a friend of mine. Who composed the opening theme music of 'Omnibus'? My friend said Virgil Thomson." I asked him, "What do you say?" He replied, "I say Aaron Copeland." I said, "You're right." The porter said, "I knew Thomson doesn't write counterpoint that way." I told that to a network president, and he was deeply unimpressed. -- Alistair Cooke "The good Christian should beware of mathematicians and all those who make empty prophecies. The danger already exists that mathematicians have made a covenant with the devil to darken the spirit and confine man in the bonds of Hell." -- Saint Augustine Quantum Mechanics is God's version of "Trust me." Who made the world I cannot tell; 'Tis made, and here am I in hell. My hand, though now my knuckles bleed, I never soiled with such a deed. -- A. E. Housman "History is a tool used by politicians to justify their intentions." -- Ted Koppel People disagree with me. I just ignore them. -- Linus Torvalds, regarding the use of C++ for the Linux kernel Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. -- Abraham Lincoln Machines certainly can solve problems, store information, correlate, and play games -- but not with pleasure. -- Leo Rosten In computing, the mean time to failure keeps getting shorter. RMS for President??? ...or ESR, he wants a new job ;) "We can't schedule an orgy, it might be construed as fighting" -- Stanley Sutton Nice guys get sick. What GOOD is a CARDBOARD suitcase ANYWAY? Are the STEWED PRUNES still in the HAIR DRYER? Don't worry so loud, your roommate can't think. Knowledge is power -- knowledge shared is power lost. -- Aleister Crowley I DON'T THINK I'M ALONE when I say I'd like to see more and more planets fall under the ruthless domination of our solar system. -- Jack Handey, The New Mexican, 1988. Question authority. "All my life I wanted to be someone; I guess I should have been more specific." -- Jane Wagner Pournelle must die! The Official MBA Handbook on doing company business on an airplane: Do not work openly on top-secret company cost documents unless you have previously ascertained that the passenger next to you is blind, a rock musician on mood-ameliorating drugs, or the unfortunate possessor of a forty-seventh chromosome. I distrust a close-mouthed man. He generally picks the wrong time to talk and says the wrong things. Talking's something you can't do judiciously, unless you keep in practice. Now, sir, we'll talk if you like. I'll tell you right out, I'm a man who likes talking to a man who likes to talk. -- Sidney Greenstreet, "The Maltese Falcon" If you drink, don't park. Accidents make people. The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but that's the way to bet. -- Damon Runyon Why is the alphabet in that order? Is it because of that song? -- Steven Wright Excellent time to become a missing person. Each of these cults correspond to one of the two antagonists in the age of Reformation. In the realm of the Apple Macintosh, as in Catholic Europe, worshipers peer devoutly into screens filled with "icons." All is sound and imagery and Appledom. Even words look like decorative filigrees in exotic typefaces. The greatest icon of all, the inviolable Apple itself, stands in the dominate position at the upper-left corner of the screen. A central corporate headquarters decrees the form of all rites and practices. Infalliable doctrine issues from one executive officer whose selection occurs in a sealed boardroom. Should anyone in his curia question his powers, the offender is excommunicated into outer darkness. The expelled heretic founds a new company, mutters obscurely of the coming age and the next computer, then disappears into silence, taking his stockholders with him. The mother company forbids financial competition as sternly as it stifles ideological competition; if you want to use computer programs that conform to Apple's orthodoxy, you must buy a computer made and sold by Apple itself. -- Edward Mendelson, "The New Republic", February 22, 1988 It was kinda like stuffing the wrong card in a computer, when you're stickin' those artificial stimulants in your arm. -- Dion, noted computer scientist Crito, I owe a cock to Asclepius; will you remember to pay the debt? -- Socrates' last words In Memphis, Tennessee, it is illegal for a woman to drive a car unless there is a man either running or walking in front of it waving a red flag to warn approaching motorists and pedestrians. FORTUNE PROVIDES QUESTIONS FOR THE GREAT ANSWERS: #13 A: Doc, Happy, Bashful, Dopey, Sneezy, Sleepy, & Grumpy Q: Who were the Democratic presidential candidates? FORTUNE'S GUIDE TO DEALING WITH REAL-LIFE SCIENCE FICTION: #2 What to do... if you get a phone call from Mars: Speak slowly and be sure to enunciate your words properly. Limit your vocabulary to simple words. Try to determine if you are speaking to someone in a leadership capacity, or an ordinary citizen. if he, she or it doesn't speak English? Hang up. There's no sense in trying to learn Martian over the phone. If your Martian really had something important to say to you, he, she or it would have taken the trouble to learn the language before calling. if you get a phone call from Jupiter? Explain to your caller, politely but firmly, that being from Jupiter, he, she or it is not "life as we know it". Try to terminate the conversation as soon as possible. It will not profit you, and the charges may have been reversed. You will have many recoverable tape errors. You fill a much-needed gap. The FALAFEL SANDWICH lands on my HEAD and I become a VEGETARIAN ... QOTD: The only easy way to tell a hamster from a gerbil is that the gerbil has more dark meat. 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" Just to have it is enough. Children aren't happy without something to ignore, And that's what parents were created for. -- Ogden Nash "Little else matters than to write good code." -- Karl Lehenbauer Ninety percent of the time things turn out worse than you thought they would. The other ten percent of the time you had no right to expect that much. -- Augustine /* we have tried to make this normal case as abnormal as possible */ -- Larry Wall in cmd.c from the perl source code Remember, DESSERT is spelled with two `s's while DESERT is spelled with one, because EVERYONE wants two desserts, but NO ONE wants two deserts. -- Miss Oglethorp, Gr. 5, PS. 59 Proposed Additions to the PDP-11 Instruction Set: PI Punch Invalid POPI Punch Operator Immediately PVLC Punch Variable Length Card RASC Read And Shred Card RPM Read Programmers Mind RSSC reduce speed, step carefully (for improved accuracy) RTAB Rewind tape and break RWDSK rewind disk RWOC Read Writing On Card SCRBL scribble to disk - faster than a write SLC Search for Lost Chord SPSW Scramble Program Status Word SRSD Seek Record and Scar Disk STROM Store in Read Only Memory TDB Transfer and Drop Bit WBT Water Binary Tree There's nothing wrong with teenagers that reasoning with them won't aggravate. Feanor - license issues are important. If we don't watch our arses now, someone's gonna come up and bite us later... An American scientist once visited the offices of the great Nobel prize winning physicist, Niels Bohr, in Copenhagen. He was amazed to find that over Bohr's desk was a horseshoe, securely nailed to the wall, with the open end up in the approved manner (so it would catch the good luck and not let it spill out). The American said with a nervous laugh, "Surely you don't believe the horseshoe will bring you good luck, do you, Professor Bohr? After all, as a scientist --" Bohr chuckled. "I believe no such thing, my good friend. Not at all. I am scarcely likely to believe in such foolish nonsense. However, I am told that a horseshoe will bring you good luck whether you believe in it or not." One advantage of talking to yourself is that you know at least somebody's listening. -- Franklin P. Jones Alan E. Davis: Some files at llug.sep.bnl.gov/pub/debian/Incoming are stamped on 10 January 1998. As I write, nowhere on Earth is it now 10 January. Craig Sanders: That just proves how advanced debian is, doesn't it :-) -- debian-devel That's one small step for a man; one giant leap for mankind. -- Neil Armstrong i have 4gb for /tmp What do you do with 4G /tmp? Compile X? yes Now I'm having INSIPID THOUGHTS about the beatiful, round wives of HOLLYWOOD MOVIE MOGULS encased in PLEXIGLASS CARS and being approached by SMALL BOYS selling FRUIT ... is it me, or is Knghtbrd snoring? they killed knghtbrd! Kysh: wichert, gecko, joeyh, and I are in a room trying to ignore Knghtbrd netgod: Knghtbrd is hard to ignore. I am practicing a fine point of ethics. It is acceptable to shoot back. It is not acceptable to shoot first. -- Zed Pobre When neither their poverty nor their honor is touched, the majority of men live content. -- Niccolo Machiavelli "Hi, I'm Professor Alan Ginsburg... But you can call me... Captain Toke." -- John Lovitz, as ex-Supreme Court nominee Alan Ginsburg, on SNL The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to make the law free. -- Henry David Thoreau Jesuit priests are DATING CAREER DIPLOMATS!! It's OKAY -- I'm an INTELLECTUAL, too. If God had really intended men to fly, he'd make it easier to get to the airport. -- George Winters Dear Ms. Postnews: I couldn't get mail through to somebody on another site. What should I do? -- Eager Beaver Dear Eager: No problem, just post your message to a group that a lot of people read. Say, "This is for John Smith. I couldn't get mail through so I'm posting it. All others please ignore." This way tens of thousands of people will spend a few seconds scanning over and ignoring your article, using up over 16 man-hours their collective time, but you will be saved the terrible trouble of checking through usenet maps or looking for alternate routes. Just think, if you couldn't distribute your message to 9000 other computers, you might actually have to (gasp) call directory assistance for 60 cents, or even phone the person. This can cost as much as a few DOLLARS (!) for a 5 minute call! And certainly it's better to spend 10 to 20 dollars of other people's money distributing the message than for you to have to waste $9 on an overnight letter, or even 25 cents on a stamp! Don't forget. The world will end if your message doesn't get through, so post it as many places as you can. -- Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette You cannot achieve the impossible without attempting the absurd. Perl has a long tradition of working around compilers. -- Larry Wall in <199708252256.PAA00105@wall.org> Never lend your car to anyone to whom you have given birth. -- Erma Bombeck The FIELD GUIDE to NORTH AMERICAN MALES SPECIES: Cranial Males SUBSPECIES: The Hacker (homo computatis) Courtship & Mating: Due to extreme deprivation, HOMO COMPUTATIS maintains a near perpetual state of sexual readiness. Courtship behavior alternates between awkward shyness and abrupt advances. When he finally mates, he chooses a female engineer with an unblinking stare, a tight mouth, and a complete collection of Campbell's soup-can recipes. Track: Trash cans full of pale green and white perforated paper and old copies of the Allen-Bradley catalog. Comments: Extremely fond of bad puns and jokes that need long explanations. Humor in the Court: Q: What can you tell us about the truthfulness and veracity of this defendant? A: Oh, she will tell the truth. She said she'd kill that sonofabitch--and she did! "You tried it just for once, found it alright for kicks, but now you find out you have a habit that sticks, you're an orgasm addict, you're always at it, and you're an orgasm addict." -- The Buzzcocks Deja vu: French., already seen; unoriginal; trite. Psychol., The illusion of having previously experienced something actually being encountered for the first time. Psychol., The illusion of having previously experienced something actually being encountered for the first time. Delay is preferable to error. -- Thomas Jefferson I'm not afraid of death -- I just don't want to be there when it happens. -- Woody Allen O love, could thou and I with fate conspire To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire, Might we not smash it to bits And mould it closer to our hearts' desire? -- Omar Khayyam, tr. FitzGerald You have an ability to sense and know higher truth. "Hawk, we're going to die." "Never say die... and certainly never say we." -- M*A*S*H I'll say it again for the logic impaired. -- Larry Wall You men out there probably think you already know how to dress for success. You know, for example, that you should not wear leisure suits or white plastic belts and shoes, unless you are going to a costume party disguised as a pig farmer vacationing at Disney World. -- Dave Barry, "How to Dress for Real Success" XLI: The more one produces, the less one gets. XLII: Simple systems are not feasible because they require infinite testing. XLIII: Hardware works best when it matters the least. XLIV: Aircraft flight in the 21st century will always be in a westerly direction, preferably supersonic, crossing time zones to provide the additional hours needed to fix the broken electronics. XLV: One should expect that the expected can be prevented, but the unexpected should have been expected. XLVI: A billion saved is a billion earned. -- Norman Augustine No one likes us. I don't know why. We may not be perfect, We give them money, But heaven knows we try. But are they grateful? But all around, No, they're spiteful, Even our old friends put us down. And they're hateful. Let's drop the big one, They don't respect us, And see what happens. So let's surprise them We'll drop the big one, And pulverize 'em. Asia's crowded, Europe's too old, Africa is far too hot, We'll save Australia. And Canada's too cold. Don't wanna hurt no kangaroos. And South America stole our name We'll build an All-American amusement Let's drop the big one, park there-- There'll be no one left to blame us. They got surfin', too! Boom! goes London, And Boom! Paree. More room for you, Oh, how peaceful it'll be! And more room for me, We'll set everybody free! And every city, You'll wear a Japanese kimono, babe; The whole world round, There'll be Italian shoes for me! Will just be another American town. They all hate us anyhow, So, let's drop the big one now. Let's drop the big one now! -- Randy Newman, "Drop the Big One" Mmmmmm-MMMMMM!! A plate of STEAMING PIECES of a PIG mixed with the shreds of SEVERAL CHICKENS!! ... Oh BOY!! I'm about to swallow a TORN-OFF section of a COW'S LEFT LEG soaked in COTTONSEED OIL and SUGAR!! ... Let's see ... Next, I'll have the GROUND-UP flesh of CUTE, BABY LAMBS fried in the MELTED, FATTY TISSUES from a warm-blooded animal someone once PETTED!! ... YUM!! That was GOOD!! For DESSERT, I'll have a TOFU BURGER with BEAN SPROUTS on a stone-ground, WHOLE WHEAT BUN!! 98% lean. If the very old will remember, the very young will listen. -- Chief Dan George 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 It's raisins that make Post Raisin Bran so raisiny ... I don't deserve this award, but I have arthritis and I don't deserve that either. -- Jack Benny Only a fool fights in a burning house. -- Kank the Klingon, "Day of the Dove", stardate unknown Are you still an ALCOHOLIC? In 1962, you could buy a pair of SHARKSKIN SLACKS, with a "Continental Belt," for $10.99!! Be careful! Is it classified? Peace, n.: In international affairs, a period of cheating between two periods of fighting. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" We must believe in free will. We have no choice. -Isaac B. Singer Ultra Short Term Nostalgia: Homesickness for the extremely recent past: "God, things seemed so much better in the world last week." -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Wasting time is an important part of living. 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" damn my office is cold. need a hot secretary to warm it up. -- Seen on #Linux So far as we are human, what we do must be either evil or good: so far as we do evil or good, we are human: and it is better, in a paradoxical way, to do evil than to do nothing: at least we exist. -- T. S. Eliot, essay on Baudelaire Yeah, that's me, Tracer Bullet. I've got eight slugs in me. One's lead, the rest bourbon. The drink packs a wallop, and I pack a revolver. I'm a private eye. -- "Calvin & Hobbes" "If the code and the comments disagree, then both are probably wrong." -- Norm Schryer The rate at which a disease spreads through a corn field is a precise measurement of the speed of blight. Paranoia is simply an optimistic outlook on life. The early worm gets the bird. Loose bits sink chips. Hewett's Observation: The rudeness of a bureaucrat is inversely proportional to his or her position in the governmental hierarchy and to the number of peers similarly engaged. It is better to live rich than to die rich. -- Samuel Johnson Kindness is the beginning of cruelty. -- Muad'dib [Frank Herbert, "Dune"] "What the scientists have in their briefcases is terrifying." -- Nikita Khrushchev I'm enthralled by combine harvesters. In fact, I yearn to have one -- as a pet. -- "The Day of the Jackal" "...[Linux's] capacity to talk via any medium except smoke signals." (By Dr. Greg Wettstein, Roger Maris Cancer Center) Snow-white! Snow-white! O Lady clear! O Queen beyond the Western Sea! O Light to us that wander here Amid the world of woven trees! Gilthoniel! O Elbereth! Clear are thy eyes and bright thy breath! Snow-white! Snow-white! We sing to thee In a far land beyond the Sea. O stars that in the Sunless Year With shining hand by her were sown, In windy fields now bright and clear We see you silver blossom blown! O Elbereth! Gilthoniel! We still remember, we who dwell In this far land beneath the trees, Thy starlight on the Western Seas. -- J. R. R. Tolkien Enjoy yourself while you're still old. "A University without students is like an ointment without a fly." -- Ed Nather, professor of astronomy at UT Austin question = ( to ) ? be : ! be; -- Wm. Shakespeare Lisp, Lisp, Lisp Machine, Lisp Machine is Fun. Lisp, Lisp, Lisp Machine, Fun for everyone. The only cultural advantage LA has over NY is that you can make a right turn on a red light. -- Woody Allen Men will always be men -- no matter where they are. -- Harry Mudd, "Mudd's Women", stardate 1329.8 Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning a lion wakes up. It knows it must outrun the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death. It doesn't matter whether you are a lion or a gazelle: when the sun comes up, you'd better be running. Stellar rays prove fibbing never pays. Embezzlement is another matter. The UNIX philosophy basically involves giving you enough rope to hang yourself. And then a couple of feet more, just to be sure. Tis man's perdition to be safe, when for the truth he ought to die. Someday somebody has got to decide whether the typewriter is the machine, or the person who operates it. It's not enough to be Hungarian; you must have talent too. -- Alexander Korda Randal said it would be tough to do in sed. He didn't say he didn't understand sed. Randal understands sed quite well. Which is why he uses Perl. :-) -- Larry Wall in <7874@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> Not only is this incomprehensible, but the ink is ugly and the paper is from the wrong kind of tree. -- Professor, EECS, George Washington University I'm looking forward to working with you on this next year. -- Professor, Harvard, on a senior thesis. Photographing a volcano is just about the most miserable thing you can do. -- Robert B. Goodman [Who has clearly never tried to use a PDP-10. Ed.] love, n.: When it's growing, you don't mind watering it with a few tears. It will be advantageous to cross the great stream ... the Dragon is on the wing in the Sky ... the Great Man rouses himself to his Work. The moving cursor writes, and having written, blinks on. Very few modern women either like or desire marriage, especially after the ceremony has been performed. Primarily women wish attention and affection. Matrimony is something they accept when there is no alternative. Really, it is a waste of time, and hazardous, to marry them. It leaves one open to a rival. Husbands, good or bad, always have rivals. Lovers, never. -- Helen Lawrenson, "Esquire" Availability is limited. If it's worth doing, it's worth doing for money. we're calling 2.2 _POTATO_?? DalNet is like the special olympics of IRC. There's a lot of drooling goin' on and everyone is a 'winner'. break; /* don't do magic till later */ -- Larry Wall in stab.c from the perl source code It is easier to write an incorrect program than understand a correct one. feature, n: A surprising property of a program. Occasionaly documented. To call a property a feature sometimes means the author did not consider that case, and the program makes an unexpected, though not necessarily wrong response. See BUG. "That's not a bug, it's a feature!" A bug can be changed to a feature by documenting it. The horror... the horror! Alas, I am dying beyond my means. -- Oscar Wilde [as he sipped champagne on his deathbed] Whom the gods would destroy, they first teach BASIC. Nemo me impune lacessit. [No one provokes me with impunity] -- Motto of the Crown of Scotland flannister, n.: The plastic yoke that holds a six-pack of beer together. -- "Sniglets", Rich Hall & Friends There is no act of treachery or mean-ness of which a political party is not capable; for in politics there is no honour. -- Benjamin Disraeli, "Vivian Grey" "Benson, you are so free of the ravages of intelligence" -- Time Bandits Gold's Law: If the shoe fits, it's ugly. Please stand for the National Anthem: God save our Gracious Queen! Long live our Noble Queen! God save the Queen! Send her victorious, Happy and glorious, Long to reign o'er us! God save the Queen! Thank you. You may resume your seat. Beware of a tall black man with one blond shoe. He only knew his iron spine held up the sky -- he didn't realize his brain had fallen to the ground. -- The Book of Serenity Stop! There was first a game of blindman's buff. Of course there was. And I no more believe Topper was really blind than I believe he had eyes in his boots. My opinion is, that it was a done thing between him and Scrooge's nephew; and that the Ghost of Christmas Present knew it. The way he went after that plump sister in the lace tucker, was an outrage on the credulity of human nature. "You have heard me speak of Professor Moriarty?" "The famous scientific criminal, as famous among crooks as --" "My blushes, Watson," Holmes murmured, in a deprecating voice. "I was about to say 'as he is unknown to the public.'" -- A. Conan Doyle, "The Valley of Fear" "Calling J-Man Kink. Calling J-Man Kink. Hash missile sighted, target Los Angeles. Disregard personal feelings about city and intercept." -- The Firesign Theatre movie, _J-Men Forever_ 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. I just know I'm a better manager when I have Joe DiMaggio in center field. -- Casey Stengel These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. * BenC wonders why he has upgraded to 3.3.5-1 before teh X maintainer I may be getting older, but I refuse to grow up! Johnson's law: Systems resemble the organizations that create them. Lies! All lies! You're all lying against my boys! -- Ma Barker Soap and education are not as sudden as a massacre, but they are more deadly in the long run. -- Mark Twain When you have 200 programmers trying to write code for one product, like Win95 or NT, what you get is a multipule personality program. By definition, the real problem is that these programs are psychotic by nature and make people crazy when they use them. -- Joan Brewer on alt.destroy.microsoft Feminists just want the human race to be a tie. A hard-luck actor who appeared in one coloossal disaster after another finally got a break, a broken leg to be exact. Someone pointed out that it's the first time the poor fellow's been in the same cast for more than a week. No proper program contains an indication which as an operator-applied occurrence identifies an operator-defining occurrence which as an indication-applied occurrence identifies an indication-defining occurrence different from the one identified by the given indication as an indication-applied occurrence. -- ALGOL 68 Report I have more humility in my little finger than you have in your whole ____BODY! -- from "Cerebus" #82 Love thy neighbor, tune thy piano. Life is a serious burden, which no thinking, humane person would wantonly inflict on someone else. -- Clarence Darrow If I kiss you, that is an psychological interaction. On the other hand, if I hit you over the head with a brick, that is also a psychological interaction. The difference is that one is friendly and the other is not so friendly. The crucial point is if you can tell which is which. -- Dolph Sharp, "I'm O.K., You're Not So Hot" And now for something completely different. 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" I can just see it now: nomination-terrorism ;-) -- Manoj haha! i nominate manoj. -- seeS If you stick a stock of liquor in your locker, It is slick to stick a lock upon your stock. Or some joker who is slicker, Will trick you of your liquor, If you fail to lock your liquor with a lock. She cried, and the judge wiped her tears with my checkbook. -- Tommy Manville Is this TERMINAL fun? Your friends will know you better in the first minute you meet than your acquaintances will know you in a thousand years. -- Richard Bach, "Illusions" Do not incinerate: contents under pressure. (null cookie; hope that's ok) "I have just one word for you, my boy...plastics." -- from "The Graduate" What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence. -- Wittgenstein Udall's Fourth Law: Any change or reform you make is going to have consequences you don't like. You will overcome the attacks of jealous associates. I never liked you, and I always will. -Samuel Goldwyn "In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point." -- Friedrich Nietzsche 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" It is now pitch dark. If you proceed, you will likely fall into a pit. If God had not given us sticky tape, it would have been necessary to invent it. Difficult Paths With but a small understanding One may follow the Way like a main road, Fearing only to leave it; Following a main road is easy, Yet people delight in difficult paths. When palaces are kept up Fields are left to weeds And granaries empty; Wearing fine clothes, Bearing sharp swords, Glutting with food and drink, Hoarding wealth and possessions - These are the ways of theft, And far from the Way. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" Repel them. Repel them. Induce them to relinquish the spheroid. -- Indiana University fans' chant for their perennially bad football team There are a lot of lies going around.... and half of them are true. -- Winston Churchill Son, someday a man is going to walk up to you with a deck of cards on which the seal is not yet broken. And he is going to offer to bet you that he can make the Ace of Spades jump out of the deck and squirt cider in your ears. But son, do not bet this man, for you will end up with a ear full of cider. -- Sky Masterson's Father A gangster assembled an engineer, a chemist, and a physicist. He explained that he was entering a horse in a race the following week and the three assembled guys had the job of assuring that the gangster's horse would win. They were to reconvene the day before the race to tell the gangster how they each propose to ensure a win. When they reconvened the gangster started with the engineer: Gangster: OK, Mr. engineer, what have you got? Engineer: Well, I've invented a way to weave metallic threads into the saddle blanket so that they will act as the plates of a battery and provide electrical shock to the horse. G: That's very good! But let's hear from the chemist. Chemist: I've synthesized a powerful stimulant that disolves into simple blood sugars after ten minutes and therefore cannot be detected in post-race tests. G: Excellent, excellent! But I want to hear from the physicist before I decide what to do. Physicist? Physicist: Well, first consider a spherical horse in simple harmonic motion... There was a little girl Who had a little curl Right in the middle of her forehead. When she was good, she was very, very good And when she was bad, she was very, very popular. -- Max Miller, "The Max Miller Blue Book" Are your glasses mended with a strip of masking tape right over your nose? Do you put pennies in the slots in your penny loafers? Does your bow-tie flash "hey you kid" in red neon at parties? Do you think pizza before noon is unhealthy? Do you use the "greasy kid's stuff" to stick down your cowlick? Do you wear a "nerd-pack" in your shirt pocket to keep the dozen or so pencils from marking the cloth? Do you think Mary Jane is somebody's name? Is illegal fishing something only a daring criminal would do? Is Batman your hero? Superman? Green Lantern? The Shadow? Do you think girls who kiss on the first date are loose? Rate yourself on the nerd-o-matic scale. (1 point for each YES answer) 0-2 -- You are really hip, a real cool cat, a hoopy frood. 3-5 -- There is hope for you yet. 6-7 -- Uh-oh, trouble in River City. 8-10 -- Your immortal soul is in peril. 11+ -- Does suicide seem attractive? Oh my GOD -- the SUN just fell into YANKEE STADIUM!! So you think that money is the root of all evil. Have you ever asked what is the root of money? -- Ayn Rand The important thing is not to stop questioning. * james would be more impressed if netgod's magic powers could stop the splits in the first place... * netgod notes debian developers are notoriously hard to impress -- Seen on #Debian It is against the grain of modern education to teach children to program. What fun is there in making plans, acquiring discipline in organizing thoughts, devoting attention to detail, and learning to be self-critical? -- Alan Perlis The net of law is spread so wide, No sinner from its sweep may hide. Its meshes are so fine and strong, They take in every child of wrong. O wondrous web of mystery! Big fish alone escape from thee! -- James Jeffrey Roche I know it's weird, but it does make it easier to write poetry in perl. :-) -- Larry Wall in <7865@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> Your mode of life will be changed for the better because of new developments. There are only two kinds of men -- the dead and the deadly. -- Helen Rowland Exceptions prove the rule, and wreck the budget. -- Miller A woman went into a hospital one day to give birth. Afterwards, the doctor came to her and said, "I have some... odd news for you." "Is my baby all right?" the woman anxiously asked. "Yes, he is," the doctor replied, "but we don't know how. Your son (we assume) was born with no body. He only has a head." Well, the doctor was correct. The Head was alive and well, though no one knew how. The Head turned out to be fairly normal, ignoring his lack of a body, and lived for some time as typical a life as could be expected under the circumstances. One day, about twenty years after the fateful birth, the woman got a phone call from another doctor. The doctor said, "I have recently perfected an operation. Your son can live a normal life now: we can graft a body onto his head!" The woman, practically weeping with joy, thanked the doctor and hung up. She ran up the stairs saying, "Johnny, Johnny, I have a *wonderful* surprise for you!" "Oh no," cried The Head, "not another HAT!" The Preacher, the Politician, the Teacher, Were each of them once a kiddie. A child, indeed, is a wonderful creature. Do I want one? God Forbiddie! -- Ogden Nash It is fruitless: to become lachrymose over precipitately departed lactate fluid. to attempt to indoctrinate a superannuated canine with innovative maneuvers. Of course it's possible to love a human being if you don't know them too well. -- Charles Bukowski Be incomprehensible. If they can't understand, they can't disagree. Punishment becomes ineffective after a certain point. Men become insensitive. -- Eneg, "Patterns of Force", stardate 2534.7 When one burns one's bridges, what a very nice fire it makes. -- Dylan Thomas Of course there's no reason for it, it's just our policy. There was a college student trying to earn some pocket money by going from house to house offering to do odd jobs. He explained this to a man who answered one door. "How much will you charge to paint my porch?" asked the man. "Forty dollars." "Fine" said the man, and gave the student the paint and brushes. Three hours later the paint-splattered lad knocked on the door again. "All done!", he says, and collects his money. "By the way," the student says, "That's not a Porsche, it's a Ferrari." To Perl, or not to Perl, that is the kvetching. -- Larry Wall in <199801200310.TAA11670@wall.org> Of what you see in books, believe 75%. Of newspapers, believe 50%. And of TV news, believe 25% -- make that 5% if the anchorman wears a blazer. Most people have two reasons for doing anything -- a good reason, and the real reason. "You can't teach seven foot." -- Frank Layton, Utah Jazz basketball coach, when asked why he had recruited a seven-foot tall auto mechanic A man is known by the company he organizes. -- Ambrose Bierce I'd give my right arm to be ambidextrous. 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" Hark ye, Clinker, you are a most notorious offender. You stand convicted of sickness, hunger, wretchedness, and want. -- Tobias Smollet You will lose an important tape file. For every vision there is an equal and opposite revision. Restaurant package, not for resale. Beggars should be no choosers. -- John Heywood Does she think we just want to sit around painting debian swirls on our toenails? -- Erinn Clark, referring to the Debian-women project They are ill discoverers that think there is no land, when they can see nothing but sea. -- Francis Bacon Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail. -- Charles Dickens, "A Christmas Carol" So I'm ugly. So what? I never saw anyone hit with his face. -- Yogi Berra "You can't make a program without broken egos." A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining and wants it back the minute it begins to rain. -- Mark Twain 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?" Are you mentally here at Pizza Hut?? < asuffield> a workstation is anything you can stick on somebodies desk and con them into using -- in #debian-devel "Hello?" "Hi baybee" "Are you Johnie Ingram?" "For you I'll be anyone" "Ermm.. Do you sell slink CD's?" "I love slinkies" Uncle Ed's Rule of Thumb: Never use your thumb for a rule. You'll either hit it with a hammer or get a splinter in it. Have you ever noticed that the people who are always trying to tell you `there's a time for work and a time for play' never find the time for play? Give me a fish and I will eat today. Teach me to fish and I will eat forever. Even if we put all these nagging thoughts [four embarrassing questions about astrology] aside for a moment, one overriding question remains to be asked. Why would the positions of celestial objects at the moment of birth have an effect on our characters, lives, or destinies? What force or influence, what sort of energy would travel from the planets and stars to all human beings and affect our development or fate? No amount of scientific-sounding jargon or computerized calculations by astrologers can disguise this central problem with astrology -- we can find no evidence of a mechanism by which celestial objects can influence us in so specific and personal a way. . . . Some astrologers argue that there may be a still unknown force that represents the astrological influence. . . .If so, astrological predictions -- like those of any scientific field -- should be easily tested. . . . Astrologers always claim to be just a little too busy to carry out such careful tests of their efficacy, so in the last two decades scientists and statisticians have generously done such testing for them. There have been dozens of well-designed tests all around the world, and astrology has failed every one of them. . . . I propose that we let those beckoning lights in the sky awaken our interest in the real (and fascinating) universe beyond our planet, and not let them keep us tied to an ancient fantasy left over from a time when we huddled by the firelight, afraid of the night. -- Andrew Fraknoi, Executive Officer, Astronomical Society of the Pacific, "Why Astrology Believers Should Feel Embarrassed," San Jose Mercury News, May 8, 1988 No one likes us. I don't know why. We may not be perfect, We give them money, But heaven knows we try. But are they grateful? But all around, No, they're spiteful, Even our old friends put us down. And they're hateful. Let's drop the big one, They don't respect us, And see what happens. So let's surprise them We'll drop the big one, And pulverize 'em. Asia's crowded, Europe's too old, Africa is far too hot, We'll save Australia. And Canada's too cold. Don't wanna hurt no kangaroos. And South America stole our name We'll build an All-American amusement Let's drop the big one, park there-- There'll be no one left to blame us. They got surfin', too! Boom! goes London, And Boom! Paree. More room for you, Oh, how peaceful it'll be! And more room for me, We'll set everybody free! And every city, You'll wear a Japanese kimono, babe; The whole world round, There'll be Italian shoes for me! Will just be another American town. They all hate us anyhow, So, let's drop the big one now. Let's drop the big one now! -- Randy Newman, "Drop the Big One" Cynic, n.: Experienced. "Verily and forsooth," replied Goodgulf darkly. "In the past year strange and fearful wonders I have seen. Fields sown with barley reap crabgrass and fungus, and even small gardens reject their artichoke hearts. There has been a hot day in December and a blue moon. Calendars are made with a month of Sundays and a blue-ribbon Holstein bore alive two insurance salesmen. The earth splits and the entrails of a goat were found tied in square knots. The face of the sun blackens and the skies have rained down soggy potato chips." "But what do all these things mean?" gasped Frito. "Beats me," said Goodgulf with a shrug, "but I thought it made good copy." -- Harvard Lampoon, "Bored of the Rings" Many people feel that if you won't let them make you happy, they'll make you suffer. "In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point." -- Friedrich Nietzsche * james would be more impressed if netgod's magic powers could stop the splits in the first place... * netgod notes debian developers are notoriously hard to impress People that can't find something to live for always seem to find something to die for. The problem is, they usually want the rest of us to die for it too. Reality is for people who lack imagination. Listen, there is no courage or any extra courage that I know of to find out the right thing to do. Now, it is not only necessary to do the right thing, but to do it in the right way and the only problem you have is what is the right thing to do and what is the right way to do it. That is the problem. But this economy of ours is not so simple that it obeys to the opinion of bias or the pronouncements of any particular individual, even to the President. This is an economy that is made up of 173 million people, and it reflects their desires, they're ready to buy, they're ready to spend, it is a thing that is too complex and too big to be affected adversely or advantageously just by a few words or any particular -- say, a little this and that, or even a panacea so alleged. -- D. D. Eisenhower, in response to: "Has the government been lacking in courage and boldness in facing up to the recession?" I tell ya, I was an ugly kid. I was so ugly that my dad kept the kid's picture that came with the wallet he bought. -- Rodney Dangerfield If it happens once, it's a bug. If it happens twice, it's a feature. If it happens more than twice, it's a design philosophy. The bone-chilling scream split the warm summer night in two, the first half being before the scream when it was fairly balmy and calm and pleasant, the second half still balmy and quite pleasant for those who hadn't heard the scream at all, but not calm or balmy or even very nice for those who did hear the scream, discounting the little period of time during the actual scream itself when your ears might have been hearing it but your brain wasn't reacting yet to let you know. -- Winning sentence, 1986 Bulwer-Lytton bad fiction contest. Al didn't smile for forty years. You've got to admire a man like that. -- from "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman" We are all born mad. Some remain so. -- Samuel Beckett Keep the number of passes in a compiler to a minimum. -- D. Gries No one may kill a man. Not for any purpose. It cannot be condoned. -- Kirk, "Spock's Brain", stardate 5431.6 If everybody minded their own business, the world would go around a deal faster. -- The Duchess, "Through the Looking Glass" Conway's Law: In any organization there will always be one person who knows what is going on. This person must be fired. Atlanta: An entire city surrounded by an airport. The world is not octal despite DEC. Simplify If we could discard knowledge and wisdom Then people would profit a hundredfold; If we could discard duty and justice Then harmonious relationships would form; If we could discard artifice and profit Then waste and theft would disappear. Yet such remedies treat only symptoms And so they are inadequate. People need personal remedies: Reveal your naked self and embrace your original nature; Bind your self-interest and control your ambition; Forget your habits and simplify your affairs. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" Should I start with the time I SWITCHED personalities with a BEATNIK hair stylist or my failure to refer five TEENAGERS to a good OCULIST? I made it a rule to forbear all direct contradictions to the sentiments of others, and all positive assertion of my own. I even forbade myself the use of every word or expression in the language that imported a fixed opinion, such as "certainly", "undoubtedly", etc. I adopted instead of them "I conceive", "I apprehend", or "I imagine" a thing to be so or so; or "so it appears to me at present". When another asserted something that I thought an error, I denied myself the pleasure of contradicting him abruptly, and of showing him immediately some absurdity in his proposition. In answering I began by observing that in certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right, but in the present case there appeared or seemed to me some difference, etc. I soon found the advantage of this change in my manner; the conversations I engaged in went on more pleasantly. The modest way in which I proposed my opinions procured them a readier reception and less contradiction. I had less mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily prevailed with others to give up their mistakes and join with me when I happened to be in the right. -- Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin Do you mean to say that I can read mail with vi too? ;-) Didn't you know that? :r /var/spool/mail/jk -- Seen on #debian-mentors Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you. -- Jean-Paul Sartre ...difference of opinion is advantageious in religion. The several sects perform the office of a common censor morum over each other. Is uniformity attainable? Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity. -- Thomas Jefferson, "Notes on Virginia" You cannot have a science without measurement. -- R. W. Hamming How do I type "for i in *.dvi do xdvi i done" in a GUI? (Discussion in comp.os.linux.misc on the intuitiveness of interfaces.) It's grad exam time... COMPUTER SCIENCE Inside your desk you'll find a listing of the DEC/VMS operating system in IBM 1710 machine code. Show what changes are necessary to convert this code into a UNIX Berkeley 7 operating system. Prove that these fixes are bug free and run correctly. You should gain at least 150% efficiency in the new system. (You should take no more than 10 minutes on this question.) MATHEMATICS If X equals PI times R^2, construct a formula showing how long it would take a fire ant to drill a hole through a dill pickle, if the length-girth ratio of the ant to the pickle were 98.17:1. GENERAL KNOWLEDGE Describe the Universe. Give three examples. Another day, another dollar. -- Vincent J. Fuller, defense lawyer for John Hinckley, upon Hinckley's acquittal for shooting President Ronald Reagan. Bedfellows make strange politicians. Lawful Dungeon Master -- and they're MY laws! Knghtbrd, if we wanted a lameass remark we would have said: Hey, neckro Be wary of strong drink. It can make you shoot at tax collectors and miss. -- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love" On Monday mornings I am dedicated to the proposition that all men are created jerks. -- H. Allen Smith, "Let the Crabgrass Grow" The girl who swears no one has ever made love to her has a right to swear. -- Sophia Loren Ma Bell is a mean mother! As to the Adjective: when in doubt, strike it out. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" If truth is beauty, how come no one has their hair done in the library? -- Lily Tomlin f u cn rd ths, u r prbbly a lsy spllr. I am a man: nothing human is alien to me. -- Publius Terentius Afer (Terence) Boys will be boys, and so will a lot of middle-aged men. -- Kin Hubbard File cabinet: A four drawer, manually activated trash compactor. The Great Movie Posters: When You're Six Tons -- And They Call You Killer -- It's Hard To Make Friends... -- Namu, the Killer Whale (1966) Meet the Girls with the Thermo-Nuclear Navels! -- Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs (1966) A GHASTLY TALE DRENCHED WITH GOUTS OF BLOOD SPURTING FROM THE VICTIMS OF A CRAZED MADMAN'S LUST. -- A Taste of Blood (1967) Ring around the collar. There's too much beauty upon this earth for lonely men to bear. -- Richard Le Gallienne The difference between legal separation and divorce is that legal separation gives the man time to hide his money. Decorate your home. It gives the illusion that your life is more interesting than it really is. -- C. Schulz (1) X=Y ; Given (2) X^2=XY ; Multiply both sides by X (3) X^2-Y^2=XY-Y^2 ; Subtract Y^2 from both sides (4) (X+Y)(X-Y)=Y(X-Y) ; Factor (5) X+Y=Y ; Cancel out (X-Y) term (6) 2Y=Y ; Substitute X for Y, by equation 1 (7) 2=1 ; Divide both sides by Y -- "Omni", proof that 2 equals 1 Cahn's Axiom: When all else fails, read the instructions. I really don't want much at all... Just a kind word, an attractive woman, and UNLIMITED BANDWIDTH!! "Only a brain-damaged operating system would support task switching and not make the simple next step of supporting multitasking." -- George McFry Microbiology Lab: Staph Only! Delta: A real man lands where he wants to. -- David Letterman "I dislike companies that have a we-are-the-high-priests-of-hardware-so-you'll- like-what-we-give-you attitude. I like commodity markets in which iron-and- silicon hawkers know that they exist to provide fast toys for software types like me to play with..." -- Eric S. Raymond Perhaps no person can be a poet, or even enjoy poetry without a certain unsoundness of mind. -- Thomas Macaulay Thank you for observing all safety precautions. Is there life before breakfast? IF I HAD A MINE SHAFT, I don't think I would just abandon it. There's got to be a better way. -- Jack Handey, The New Mexican, 1988. Our missions are peaceful -- not for conquest. When we do battle, it is only because we have no choice. -- Kirk, "The Squire of Gothos", stardate 2124.5 As you grow older, you will still do foolish things, but you will do them with much more enthusiasm. -- The Cowboy Prevent forest fires. After all my erstwhile dear, My no longer cherished, Need we say it was not love, Just because it perished? -- Edna St. Vincent Millay A team effort is a lot of people doing what I say. -- Michael Winner, British film director Thinking is dangerous. It leads to ideas. -- Seen on #Debian Dibble's First Law of Sociology: Some do, some don't. Lemme make sure I'm not wasting time here... bcwhite will remove pkgs that havent been fixed that have outstanding bugs of severity "important". True or false? jim: "important" or higher. True. Then we're about to lose ftp.debian.org and dpkg :) * netgod will miss dpkg -- it was occasionally useful We still have rpm.... -- Seen on #Debian Ever notice that the word "therapist" breaks down into "the rapist"? Simple coincidence? Maybe... "If the future navigation system [for interactive networked services on the NII] looks like something from Microsoft, it will never work." (Chairman of Walt Disney Television & Telecommunications) The absence of labels [in ECL] is probably a good thing. -- T. Cheatham Tell me, O Octopus, I begs, Is those things arms, or is they legs? I marvel at thee, Octopus; If I were thou, I'd call me us. -- Ogden Nash Concept, n.: Any "idea" for which an outside consultant billed you more than $25,000. He draweth out the thread of his verbosity finer than the staple of his argument. -- William Shakespeare, "Love's Labour's Lost" There are 3 types of guys -- the ones who hate nerds (all nerds, that is; girls aren't let off the hook); the ones who are scared off by girls who are slightly more intelligent than average; and the guys who are also somewhat more intelligent than average, but are so shy that they can't put 2 words together when they're within 20 feet of a girl. -- Vikki Roemer on debian-curiosa He who laughs last didn't get the joke. Nowlan's Theory: He who hesitates is not only lost, but several miles from the next freeway exit. I've already got a female to worry about. Her name is the Enterprise. -- Kirk, "The Corbomite Maneuver", stardate 1514.0 I cannot overemphasize the importance of good grammar. What a crock. I could easily overemphasize the importance of good grammar. For example, I could say: "Bad grammar is the leading cause of slow, painful death in North America," or "Without good grammar, the United States would have lost World War II." -- Dave Barry, "An Utterly Absurd Look at Grammar" Tax and title extra. Death is life's way of telling you you've been fired. -- R. Geis I can't mate in captivity. -- Gloria Steinem, on why she has never married. Many a wife thinks her husband is the world's greatest lover. But she can never catch him at it. * cesarb wonders if in less than a week Carmack will end up receiving in e-mail a courtesy copy of a version of the Quake source which is four times faster than what went out of his virtual hands... I'm reporting for duty as a modern person. I want to do the Latin Hustle now! Department chairmen never die, they just lose their faculties. We'll be recording at the Paradise Friday night. Live, on the Death label. -- Swan, "Phantom of the Paradise" "I am, therefore I am." -- Akira Interchangeable parts won't. WHO sees a BEACH BUNNY sobbing on a SHAG RUG?! Ambition Those who wish to change the world According with their desire Cannot succeed. The world is shaped by the Way; It cannot be shaped by the self. Trying to change it, you damage it; Trying to possess it, you lose it. So some will lead, while others follow. Some will be warm, others cold Some will be strong, others weak. Some will get where they are going While others fall by the side of the road. So the sage will be neither extravagant nor violent. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" If you had just a minute to breathe, And they granted you one final wish, Would you ask for something Like another chance? -- Traffic, "The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys" It's a good thing we don't get all the government we pay for. "As I was walking among the fires of Hell, delighted with the enjoyments of Genius; which to Angels look like torment and insanity. I collected some of their Proverbs..." - Blake, "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell" Change your thoughts and you change your world. Life is a series of rude awakenings. -- R. V. Winkle A well-used door needs no oil on its hinges. A swift-flowing steam does not grow stagnant. Neither sound nor thoughts can travel through a vacuum. Software rots if not used. These are great mysteries. -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" FEELINGS are cascading over me!!! Fried's 1st Rule: Increased automation of clerical function invariably results in increased operational costs. A billion here, a billion there -- pretty soon it adds up to real money. -- Sen. Everett Dirksen, on the U.S. defense budget "The urge to destroy is also a creative urge." -- Bakunin [ed. note - I would say: The urge to destroy may sometimes be a creative urge.] Integrity has no need for rules. I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute -- where no Catholic prelate would tell the president (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote--where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference--and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him or the people who might elect him. - from John F. Kennedy's address to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association September 12, 1960. Sturgeon's Law: 90% of everything is crud. Hacking's just another word for nothing left to kludge. Fog Lamps, n.: Excessively (often obnoxiously) bright lamps mounted on the fronts of automobiles; used on dry, clear nights to indicate that the driver's brain is in a fog. See also "Idiot Lights". Resisting temptation is easier when you think you'll probably get another chance later on. When you jump for joy, beware that no-one moves the ground from beneath your feet. -- Stanislaw Jerzy Lec, "Unkempt Thoughts" ... so long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom, those who wish to tyrranize will do so; for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise, to put shackles upon sleeping men. -- Voltarine de Cleyre In fiction the recourse of the powerless is murder; in life the recourse of the powerless is petty theft. Woman was taken out of man -- not out of his head, to rule over him; nor out of his feet, to be trampled under by him; but out of his side, to be equal to him -- under his arm, that he might protect her, and near his heart that he might love her. -- Henry We can found no scientific discipline, nor a healthy profession on the technical mistakes of the Department of Defense and IBM. -- Edsger Dijkstra Stability itself is nothing else than a more sluggish motion. The divinity of Jesus is made a convenient cover for absurdity. Nowhere in the Gospels do we find a precept for Creeds, Confessions, Oaths, Doctrines, and whole carloads of other foolish trumpery that we find in Christianity. -- John Adams Good news is just life's way of keeping you off balance. A real diplomat is one who can cut his neighbor's throat without having his neighbour notice it. -- Trygve Lie A wise man can see more from a mountain top than a fool can from the bottom of a well. Fortune's Exercising Truths: 1: Richard Simmons gets paid to exercise like a lunatic. You don't. 2. Aerobic exercises stimulate and speed up the heart. So do heart attacks. 3. Exercising around small children can scar them emotionally for life. 4. Sweating like a pig and gasping for breath is not refreshing. 5. No matter what anyone tells you, isometric exercises cannot be done quietly at your desk at work. People will suspect manic tendencies as you twitter around in your chair. 6. Next to burying bones, the thing a dog enjoys mosts is tripping joggers. 7. Locking four people in a tiny, cement-walled room so they can run around for an hour smashing a little rubber ball -- and each other -- with a hard racket should immediately be recognized for what it is: a form of insanity. 8. Fifty push-ups, followed by thirty sit-ups, followed by ten chin-ups, followed by one throw-up. 9. Any activity that can't be done while smoking should be avoided. When oxygen Tech played Hydrogen U. The Game had just begun, when Hydrogen scored two fast points And Oxygen still had none Then Oxygen scored a single goal And thus it did remain, At Hydrogen 2 and Oxygen 1 Called because of rain. I'll pretend to trust you if you'll pretend to trust me. Many a bum show has been saved by the flag. -- George M. Cohan 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." He thought of Musashi, the Sword Saint, standing in his garden more than three hundred years ago. "What is the 'Body of a rock'?" he was asked. In answer, Musashi summoned a pupil of his and bid him kill himself by slashing his abdomen with a knife. Just as the pupil was about to comply, the Master stayed his hand, saying, "That is the 'Body of a rock'." -- Eric Van Lustbader This fortune was brought to you by the people at Hewlett-Packard. The fact that 47 PEOPLE are yelling and sweat is cascading down my SPINAL COLUMN is fairly enjoyable!! Authors (and perhaps columnists) eventually rise to the top of whatever depths they were once able to plumb. -- Stanley Kaufman You'd better smile when they watch you, smile like you're in control. -- Smile, "Was (Not Was)" Misfortunes arrive on wings and leave on foot. I've got an IDEA!! Why don't I STARE at you so HARD, you forget your SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER!! Your education begins where what is called your education is over. Decorate your home. It gives the illusion that your life is more interesting than it really is. -- C. Schulz Auction: A gyp off the old block. 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> Teach children to be polite and courteous in the home, and, when they grow up, they won't be able to edge a car onto a freeway. Perhaps the world's second worst crime is boredom. The first is being a bore. -- Cecil Beaton Truth never comes into the world but like a bastard, to the ignominy of him that brought her birth. -- Milton Satire is what closes in New Haven. Look DEEP into the OPENINGS!! Do you see any ELVES or EDSELS ... or a HIGHBALL?? ... Wilcox's Law: A pat on the back is only a few centimeters from a kick in the pants. Travel important today; Internal Revenue men arrive tomorrow. The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern. -- Lord Acton Old MacDonald had an agricultural real estate tax abatement. "How did you spend the weekend?" asked the pretty brunette secretary of her blonde companion. "Fishing through the ice," she replied. "Fishing through the ice? Whatever for?" "Olives." To a Californian, a person must prove himself criminally insane before he is allowed to drive a taxi in New York. For New York cabbies, honesty and stopping at red lights are both optional. -- From "East vs. West: The War Between the Coasts Love makes the world go 'round, with a little help from intrinsic angular momentum. > : Any porters out there should feel happier knowing that DEC is shipping > : me an AlphaPC that I intend to try getting linux running on: this will > : definitely help flush out some of the most flagrant unportable stuff. > : The Alpha is much more different from the i386 than the 68k stuff is, so > : it's likely to get most of the stuff fixed. > > It's posts like this that almost convince us non-believers that there > really is a god. (A follow-up by alovell@kerberos.demon.co.uk, Anthony Lovell, to Linus's remarks about porting) The animals are not as stupid as one thinks -- they have neither doctors nor lawyers. -- L. Docquier Don't let your status become too quo! What we Are is God's gift to us. What we Become is our gift to God. May your Tongue stick to the Roof of your Mouth with the Force of a Thousand Caramels. I never deny, I never contradict. I sometimes forget. -- Benjamin Disraeli, British PM, on dealing with the Royal Family Living your life is a task so difficult, it has never been attempted before. Quantity is no substitute for quality, but its the only one we've got. I'm going to raise an issue and stick it in your ear. -- John Foreman I am the wandering glitch -- catch me if you can. Glogg (a traditional Scandinavian holiday drink): fifth of dry red wine fifth of Aquavit 1 and 1/2 inch piece of cinnamon 10 cardamom seeds 1 cup raisins 4 dried figs 1 cup blanched or flaked almonds a few pieces of dried orange peel 5 cloves 1/2 lb. sugar cubes Heat up the wine and hard stuff (which may be substituted with wine for the faint of heart) in a big pot after adding all the other stuff EXCEPT the sugar cubes. Just when it reaches boiling, put the sugar in a wire strainer, moisten it in the hot brew, lift it out and ignite it with a match. Dip the sugar several times in the liquid until it is all dissolved. Serve hot in cups with a few raisins and almonds in each cup. N.B. Aquavit may be hard to find and expensive to boot. Use it only if you really have a deep-seated desire to be fussy, or if you are of Swedish extraction. Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society. -- Mark Twain If you are going to walk on thin ice, you may as well dance. Making files is easy under the UNIX operating system. Therefore, users tend to create numerous files using large amounts of file space. It has been said that the only standard thing about all UNIX systems is the message-of-the-day telling users to clean up their files. -- System V.2 administrator's guide I can see him a'comin' With his big boots on, With his big thumb out, He wants to get me. He wants to hurt me. He wants to bring me down. But some time later, When I feel a little straighter, I'll come across a stranger Who'll remind me of the danger, And then.... I'll run him over. Pretty smart on my part! To find my way... In the dark! -- Phil Ochs "I distrust a close-mouthed man. He generally picks the wrong time to talk and says the wrong things. Talking's something you can't do judiciously, unless you keep in practice. Now, sir, we'll talk if you like. I'll tell you right out, I'm a man who likes talking to a man who likes to talk." -- Sidney Greenstreet, _The Maltese Falcon_ We're mortal -- which is to say, we're ignorant, stupid, and sinful -- but those are only handicaps. Our pride is that nevertheless, now and then, we do our best. A few times we succeed. What more dare we ask for? -- Ensign Flandry My computer can beat up your computer. -- Karl Lehenbauer Some husbands are living proof that a woman can take a joke. OK, so you're a Ph.D. Just don't touch anything. Life is a biochemical reaction to the stimulus of the surrounding environment in a stable ecosphere, while a bowl of cherries is a round container filled with little red fruits on sticks. You are not dead yet. But watch for further reports. Anybody with money to burn will easily find someone to tend the fire. Never ask two questions in a business letter. The reply will discuss the one you are least interested, and say nothing about the other. Honesty is the best policy, but insanity is a better defense. It is like saying that for the cause of peace, God and the Devil will have a high-level meeting. -- Rev. Carl McIntire, on Nixon's China trip As I was walking down the street one dark and dreary day, I came upon a billboard and much to my dismay, The words were torn and tattered, From the storm the night before, The wind and rain had done its work and this is how it goes, Smoke Coca-Cola cigarettes, chew Wrigleys Spearmint beer, Ken-L-Ration dog food makes your complexion clear, Simonize your baby in a Hershey candy bar, And Texaco's a beauty cream that's used by every star. Take your next vacation in a brand new Frigedaire, Learn to play the piano in your winter underwear, Doctors say that babies should smoke until they're three, And people over sixty-five should bathe in Lipton tea. There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. -- Oscar Wilde Your love life will be... interesting. ** MAXIMUM TERMINALS ACTIVE. TRY AGAIN LATER ** QOTD: The forest may be quiet, but that doesn't mean the snakes have gone away. "I thought that you said you were 20 years old!" "As a programmer, yes," she replied, "And you claimed to be very near two meters tall!" "You said you were blonde, but you lied!" Oh, she was a hacker and he was one, too, They had so much in common, you'd say. They exchanged jokes and poems, and clever new hacks, And prompts that were cute or risque'. He sent her a picture of his brother Sam, She sent one from some past high school day, And it might have gone on for the rest of their lives, If they hadn't met in L.A. "Your beard is an armpit," she said in disgust. He answered, "Your armpit's a beard!" And they chorused: "I think I could stand all the rest If you were not so totally weird!" If she had not said what he wanted to hear, And he had not done just the same, They'd have been far more honest, and never have met, And would not have had fun with the game. -- Judith Schrier, "Face to Face After Six Months of Electronic Mail" Like an expensive sports car, fine-tuned and well-built, Portia was sleek, shapely, and gorgeous, her red jumpsuit moulding her body, which was as warm as seatcovers in July, her hair as dark as new tires, her eyes flashing like bright hubcaps, and her lips as dewy as the beads of fresh rain on the hood; she was a woman driven -- fueled by a single accelerant -- and she needed a man, a man who wouldn't shift from his views, a man to steer her along the right road: a man like Alf Romeo. -- Rachel Sheeley, winner The hair ball blocking the drain of the shower reminded Laura she would never see her little dog Pritzi again. -- Claudia Fields, runner-up It could have been an organically based disturbance of the brain -- perhaps a tumor or a metabolic deficiency -- but after a thorough neurological exam it was determined that Byron was simply a jerk. -- Jeff Jahnke, runner-up Winners in the 7th Annual Bulwer-Lytton Bad Writing Contest. The contest is named after the author of the immortal lines: "It was a dark and stormy night." The object of the contest is to write the opening sentence of the worst possible novel. Biology grows on you. Adopted kids are such a pain -- you have to teach them how to look like you ... -- Gilda Radner Lay off the muses, it's a very tough dollar. -- S. J. Perelman 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. 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" The world is coming to an end--save your buffers! Dirksen's Three Laws of Politics: (1) Get elected. (2) Get re-elected. (3) Don't get mad, get even. -- Sen. Everett Dirksen Nintendo Declares GCN Most Popular Console Ever Who are they kidding? knghtbrd: Stock holders? Regarding astral projection, Woody Allen once wrote, "This is not a bad way to travel, although there is usually a half-hour wait for luggage." Dinosaurs aren't extinct. They've just learned to hide in the trees. QOTD: "You're so dumb you don't even have wisdom teeth." "Humpf!" Humpfed a voice! "For almost two days you've run wild and insisted on chatting with persons who've never existed. Such carryings-on in our peaceable jungle! We've had quite enough of you bellowing bungle! And I'm here to state," snapped the big kangaroo, "That your silly nonsensical game is all through!" And the young kangaroo in her pouch said, "Me, too!" "With the help of the Wickersham Brothers and dozens of Wickersham Uncles and Wickersham Cousins and Wickersham In-Laws, whose help I've engaged, You're going to be roped! And you're going to be caged! And, as for your dust speck... Hah! That we shall boil in a hot steaming kettle of Beezle-Nut oil!" -- Dr. Seuss "Horton Hears a Who" We don't claim Interactive EasyFlow is good for anything -- if you think it is, great, but it's up to you to decide. If Interactive EasyFlow doesn't work: tough. If you lose a million because Interactive EasyFlow messes up, it's you that's out the million, not us. If you don't like this disclaimer: tough. We reserve the right to do the absolute minimum provided by law, up to and including nothing. This is basically the same disclaimer that comes with all software packages, but ours is in plain English and theirs is in legalese. We didn't really want to include any disclaimer at all, but our lawyers insisted. We tried to ignore them but they threatened us with the attack shark at which point we relented. -- Haven Tree Software Limited, "Interactive EasyFlow" I'm thinking about DIGITAL READ-OUT systems and computer-generated IMAGE FORMATIONS ... Distinctive, adj.: A different color or shape than our competitors. You can rent this space for only $5 a week. "Plastic gun. Ingenious. More coffee, please." -- The Phantom comics No matter how cynical you get, it's impossible to keep up. A man wrapped up in himself makes a very small package. The honeymoon is over when he phones to say he'll be late for supper and she's already left a note that it's in the refrigerator. -- Bill Lawrence When you have an efficient government, you have a dictatorship. -- Harry Truman "Who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard disk?" Microsoft spel chekar vor sail, worgs grate !! -- Felix von Leitner, leitner@inf.fu-berlin.de Everything ends badly. Otherwise it wouldn't end. And thou shalt eat it as barley cakes, and thou shalt bake it with dung that cometh out of man, in their sight...Then he [the Lord!] said unto me, Lo, I have given thee cow's dung for man's dung, and thou shalt prepare thy bread therewith. [Ezek. 4:12-15 (KJV)] FORTUNE PROVIDES QUESTIONS FOR THE GREAT ANSWERS: #13 A: Doc, Happy, Bashful, Dopey, Sneezy, Sleepy, & Grumpy Q: Who were the Democratic presidential candidates? HAIR TONICS, please!! If you laid all of our laws end to end, there would be no end. -- Mark Twain Bondage maybe, discipline never! -- T.K. It matters not whether you win or lose; what matters is whether II win or lose. -- Darrin Weinberg Vital papers will demonstrate their vitality by spontaneously moving from where you left them to where you can't find them. If you don't know what game you're playing, don't ask what the score is. In any world menu, Canada must be considered the vichyssoise of nations -- it's cold, half-French, and difficult to stir. -- Stuart Keate Of course, this being Perl, we could always take both approaches. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199709021744.KAA12428@wall.org> If you laid all of our laws end to end, there would be no end. -- Mark Twain For some reason, this fortune reminds everyone of Marvin Zelkowitz. You will outgrow your usefulness. A nuclear war can ruin your whole day. "They are both businesses - if you have given them enough money, I'm sure they'll do whatever the hell you ask:->" -- David Welton I am not very happy acting pleased whenever prominent scientists overmagnify intellectual enlightenment Age before beauty; and pearls before swine. -- Dorothy Parker Your domestic life may be harmonious. Since this database is not used for profit, and since entire works are not published, it falls under fair use, as we understand it. However, if any half-assed idiot decides to make a profit off of this, they will need to double check it all... -- Notes included with the default fortunes database Clovis' Consideration of an Atmospheric Anomaly: The perversity of nature is nowhere better demonstrated than by the fact that, when exposed to the same atmosphere, bread becomes hard while crackers become soft. The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. -- Oscar Wilde > I get the following error messages at bootup, could anyone tell me > what they mean? > fcntl_setlk() called by process 51 (lpd) with broken flock() emulation They mean that you have not read the documentation when upgrading the kernel. -- seen on c.o.l.misc Although we modern persons tend to take our electric lights, radios, mixers, etc., for granted, hundreds of years ago people did not have any of these things, which is just as well because there was no place to plug them in. Then along came the first Electrical Pioneer, Benjamin Franklin, who flew a kite in a lighting storm and received a serious electrical shock. This proved that lighting was powered by the same force as carpets, but it also damaged Franklin's brain so severely that he started speaking only in incomprehensible maxims, such as "A penny saved is a penny earned." Eventually he had to be given a job running the post office. -- Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?" Tax reform means "Don't tax you, don't tax me, tax that fellow behind the tree." -- Russell Long The three best things about going to school are June, July, and August. You will attract cultured and artistic people to your home. The wombat lives across the seas, Among the far Antipodes. He may exist on nuts and berries, Or then again, on missionaries; His distant habitat precludes Conclusive knowledge of his moods. But I would not engage the wombat In any form of mortal combat. -- "The Wombat" He who is intoxicated with wine will be sober again in the course of the night, but he who is intoxicated by the cupbearer will not recover his senses until the day of judgement. -- Saadi For best results, follow directions carefully. Well, it's hard for a mere man to believe that woman doesn't have equal rights. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower I don't drink, I don't like it, it makes me feel too good. -- K. Coates What's so funny? "Text processing has made it possible to right-justify any idea, even one which cannot be justified on any other grounds." -- J. Finnegan, USC. The Man Who Almost Invented The Vacuum Cleaner The man officially credited with inventing the vacuum cleaner is Hubert Cecil Booth. However, he got the idea from a man who almost invented it. In 1901 Booth visited a London music-hall. On the bill was an American inventor with his wonder machine for removing dust from carpets. The machine comprised a box about one foot square with a bag on top. After watching the act -- which made everyone in the front six rows sneeze -- Booth went round to the inventor's dressing room. "It should suck not blow," said Booth, coming straight to the point. "Suck?", exclaimed the enraged inventor. "Your machine just moves the dust around the room," Booth informed him. "Suck? Suck? Sucking is not possible," was the inventor's reply and he stormed out. Booth proved that it was by the simple expedient of kneeling down, pursing his lips and sucking the back of an armchair. "I almost choked," he said afterwards. -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures" A pretty woman can do anything; an ugly woman must do everything. "I went to a job interview the other day, the guy asked me if I had any questions , I said yes, just one, if you're in a car traveling at the speed of light and you turn your headlights on, does anything happen? He said he couldn't answer that, I told him sorry, but I couldn't work for him then. -- Steven Wright A couple of young fellers were fishing at their special pond off the beaten track when out of the bushes jumped the Game Warden. Immediately, one of the boys threw his rod down and started running through the woods like the proverbial bat out of hell, and hot on his heels ran the Game Warden. After about a half mile the fella stopped and stooped over with his hands on his thighs, whooping and heaving to catch his breath as the Game Warden finally caught up to him. "Let's see yer fishin' license, boy," the Warden gasped. The man pulled out his wallet and gave the Game Warden a valid fishing license. "Well, son", snarled the Game Warden, "You must be about as dumb as a box of rocks! You didn't have to run if you have a license!" "Yes, sir," replied his victim, "but, well, see, my friend back there, he don't have one!" I should probably reboot... ok brb So, what apart form avoiding virii, memory leaks, and rampant crashing does Linux reallhy offer :) reliable multitasking? That's the thing about people who think they hate computers. What they really hate is lousy programmers. -- Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle in "Oath of Fealty" The autodecrement is not magical. -- Larry Wall in the perl man page Men are always ready to respect anything that bores them. -- Marilyn Monroe "Of course power tools and alcohol don't mix. Everyone knows power tools aren't soluble in alcohol..." -- Crazy Nigel The idea is to die young as late as possible. -- Ashley Montague Every person, all the events in your life are there because you have drawn them there. What you choose to do with them is up to you. -- Messiah's Handbook : Reminders for the Advanced Soul "We never make assertions, Miss Taggart," said Hugh Akston. "That is the moral crime peculiar to our enemies. We do not tell -- we *show*. We do not claim -- we *prove*." -- Ayn Rand, _Atlas Shrugged_ Well, you know, no matter where you go, there you are. -- Buckaroo Banzai A professor is one who talks in someone else's sleep. I have seen these EGG EXTENDERS in my Supermarket ... I have read the INSTRUCTIONS ... Life is like an analogy. Unix is the worst operating system; except for all others. -- Berry Kercheval All kings is mostly rapscallions. -- Mark Twain Nature always sides with the hidden flaw. It is inconceivable that a judicious observer from another solar system would see in our species -- which has tended to be cruel, destructive, wasteful, and irrational -- the crown and apex of cosmic evolution. Viewing us as the culmination of *anything* is grotesque; viewing us as a transitional species makes more sense -- and gives us more hope. - Betty McCollister, "Our Transitional Species", Free Inquiry magazine, Vol. 8, No. 1 You never get a second chance to make a first impression. Talking about music is like dancing about architecture. -- Laurie Anderson "The argument that the literal story of Genesis can qualify as science collapses on three major grounds: the creationists' need to invoke miracles in order to compress the events of the earth's history into the biblical span of a few thousand years; their unwillingness to abandon claims clearly disproved, including the assertion that all fossils are products of Noah's flood; and their reliance upon distortion, misquote, half-quote, and citation out of context to characterize the ideas of their opponents." -- Stephen Jay Gould, "The Verdict on Creationism", The Skeptical Inquirer, Winter 87/88, pg. 186 Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been. -- Mark Twain It's OKAY -- I'm an INTELLECTUAL, too. "No one talks peace unless he's ready to back it up with war." "He talks of peace if it is the only way to live." -- Colonel Green and Surak of Vulcan, "The Savage Curtain", stardate 5906.5. A penny saved is a penny to squander. -- Ambrose Bierce Falling in love is a lot like dying. You never get to do it enough to become good at it. Hackers are just a migratory lifeform with a tropism for computers. Troubled day for virgins over 16 who are beautiful and wealthy and live in eucalyptus trees. Don't look back, the lemmings are gaining on you. Do what comes naturally. Seethe and fume and throw a tantrum. Oh, well, I guess this is just going to be one of those lifetimes. Living in LA is like not having a date on Saturday night. -- Candice Bergen knghtbrd: and the meek shall inherit k-mart Theory is gray, but the golden tree of life is green. -- Goethe Fortune finishes the great quotations, #21 Shall I compare thee to a Summer day? No, I guess not. It's the Magic that counts. -- Larry Wall on Perl's apparent ugliness A good question is never answered. It is not a bolt to be tightened into place but a seed to be planted and to bear more seed toward the hope of greening the landscape of idea. -- John Ciardi When in doubt, have a man come through the door with a gun in his hand. -- Raymond Chandler Politics: A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage. -- Ambrose Bierce Cursor, n.: One whose program will not run. -- Robb Russon Q: Why did the chicken cross the road? A: He was giving it last rites. : The following (relative to AutoSplit 1.03) attempts to please everyone : and perhaps pleases no one: I think that's way cool. -- Larry Wall in <199709292015.NAA09627@wall.org> Whip it, baby. Whip it right. Whip it, baby. Whip it all night! If a million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing. -- Anatole France The truth about a man lies first and foremost in what he hides. -- Andre Malraux Beauty seldom recommends one woman to another. "No matter where you go, there you are..." -- Buckaroo Banzai No amount of careful planning will ever replace dumb luck. Gates' Law: Every 18 months, the speed of software halves. try again Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning a lion wakes up. It knows it must outrun the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death. It doesn't matter whether you are a lion or a gazelle: when the sun comes up, you'd better be running. A bug in the code is worth two in the documentation. Content: 80% POLYESTER, 20% DACRONi ... The waitress's UNIFORM sheds TARTAR SAUCE like an 8" by 10" GLOSSY ... Suffering alone exists, none who suffer; The deed there is, but no doer thereof; Nirvana is, but no one is seeking it; The Path there is, but none who travel it. -- "Buddhist Symbolism", Symbols and Values And if you wonder, What I am doing, As I am heading for the sink. I am spitting out all the bitterness, Along with half of my last drink. Some people have no respect for age unless it's bottled. Captain Penny's Law: You can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you Can't Fool Mom. Everybody is somebody else's weirdo. -- Dykstra and those that say: fibre cables have a minimum bend radius and pull tension? bah! *yank* IT'S FIBER YOU FREAKS :P culus, you hoser, it's fibre. am I gonna have to come over the mountains and give you a wedgie? Of course I can keep secrets. It's the people I tell them to that can't keep them. -Anthony Haden-Guest It is very difficult to prophesy, especially when it pertains to the future. Now, it we had this sort of thing: yield -a for yield to all traffic yield -t for yield to trucks yield -f for yield to people walking (yield foot) yield -d t* for yield on days starting with t ...you'd have a lot of dead people at intersections, and traffic jams you wouldn't believe... (Discussion in comp.os.linux.misc on the intuitiveness of commands.) I don't know who my grandfather was; I am much more concerned to know what his grandson will be. -- Abraham Lincoln It appears that PL/I (and its dialects) is, or will be, the most widely used higher level language for systems programming. -- J. Sammet diplomacy, n: Lying in state. It is not well to be thought of as one who meekly submits to insolence and intimidation. Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable. -- H. L. Mencken * Endy needs to consult coffee :P coffee the bot person, not coffee the beverage :) consulting the beverage may help too => Fifty flippant frogs Walked by on flippered feet And with their slime they made the time Unnaturally fleet. God is really only another artist. He invented the giraffe, the elephant and the cat. He has no real style, He just goes on trying other things. -- Pablo Picasso "It was a Roman who said it was sweet to die for one's country. The Greeks never said it was sweet to die for anything. They had no vital lies." -- Edith Hamilton, "The Greek Way" petribar: Any sun-bleached prehistoric candy that has been sitting in the window of a vending machine too long. -- Rich Hall, "Sniglets" NOTICE: -- THE ELEVATORS WILL BE OUT OF ORDER TODAY -- (The nearest working elevator is in the building across the street.) The notes blatted skyward as they rose over the Canada geese, feathered rumps mooning the day, webbed appendages frantically pedaling unseen bicycles in their search for sustenance, driven by cruel Nature's maxim, 'Ya wanna eat, ya gotta work,' and at last I knew Pittsburgh. -- Winning sentence, 1987 Bulwer-Lytton bad fiction contest. "Nine years of ballet, asshole." -- Shelly Long, to the bad guy after making a jump over a gorge that he couldn't quite, in "Outrageous Fortune" "Hi, I'm Preston A. Mantis, president of Consumers Retail Law Outlet. As you can see by my suit and the fact that I have all these books of equal height on the shelves behind me, I am a trained legal attorney. Do you have a car or a job? Do you ever walk around? If so, you probably have the makings of an excellent legal case. Although of course every case is different, I would definitely say that based on my experience and training, there's no reason why you shouldn't come out of this thing with at least a cabin cruiser. "Remember, at the Preston A. Mantis Consumers Retail Law Outlet, our motto is: 'It is very difficult to disprove certain kinds of pain.'" -- Dave Barry, "Pain and Suffering" The problem with engineers is that they tend to cheat in order to get results. The problem with mathematicians is that they tend to work on toy problems in order to get results. The problem with program verifiers is that they tend to cheat at toy problems in order to get results. Where's SANDY DUNCAN? X windows: You'd better sit down. Don't laugh. It could be YOUR thesis project. Why do it right when you can do it wrong? Live the nightmare. Our bugs run faster. When it absolutely, positively HAS to crash overnight. There ARE no rules. You'll wish we were kidding. Everything you never wanted in a window system. And more. Dissatisfaction guaranteed. There's got to be a better way. The next best thing to keypunching. Leave the thrashing to us. We wrote the book on core dumps. Even your dog won't like it. More than enough rope. Garbage at your fingertips. Incompatibility. Shoddiness. Uselessness. X windows. These screamingly hilarious gogs ensure owners of X Ray Gogs to be the life of any party. -- X-Ray Gogs Instructions You are not dead yet. But watch for further reports. QOTD: "I'm just a boy named 'su'..." F u cn rd ths u cnt spl wrth a dm! Uncle Ed's Rule of Thumb: Never use your thumb for a rule. You'll either hit it with a hammer or get a splinter in it. The fact that it works is immaterial. -- L. Ogborn Metermaids eat their young. Statistics means never having to say you're certain. Debug is human, de-fix divine. Real Users find the one combination of bizarre input values that shuts down the system for days. It's not easy, being green. -- Kermit the Frog All seems condemned in the long run to approximate a state akin to Gaussian noise. -- James Martin PLUG IT IN!!! You will be run over by a bus. Q: Why do ducks have big flat feet? A: To stamp out forest fires. Q: Why do elephants have big flat feet? A: To stamp out flaming ducks. When your memory goes, forget it! What you see is from outside yourself, and may come, or not, but is beyond your control. But your fear is yours, and yours alone, like your voice, or your fingers, or your memory, and therefore yours to control. If you feel powerless over your fear, you have not yet admitted that it is yours, to do with as you will. -- Marion Zimmer Bradley, "Stormqueen" When I came back to Dublin I was courtmartialed in my absence and sentenced to death in my absence, so I said they could shoot me in my absence. -- Brendan Behan I never met a piece of chocolate I didn't like. Knock, knock! Who's there? Sam and Janet. Sam and Janet who? Sam and Janet Evening... 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" The first 90% of a project takes 90% of the time, the last 10% takes the other 90% of the time. Tomorrow, this will be part of the unchangeable past but fortunately, it can still be changed today. The meek don't want it. If people concentrated on the really important things in life, there'd be a shortage of fishing poles. -- Doug Larson What is tolerance? -- it is the consequence of humanity. We are all formed of frailty and error; let us pardon reciprocally each other's folly -- that is the first law of nature. -- Voltaire Beifeld's Principle: The probability of a young man meeting a desirable and receptive young female increases by pyramidical progression when he is already in the company of (1) a date, (2) his wife, (3) a better-looking and richer male friend. -- R. Beifeld There is a secret person undamaged within every individual. -- Paul Shepard The primary function of the design engineer is to make things difficult for the fabricator and impossible for the serviceman. It is possible by ingenuity and at the expense of clarity... {to do almost anything in any language}. However, the fact that it is possible to push a pea up a mountain with your nose does not mean that this is a sensible way of getting it there. Each of these techniques of language extension should be used in its proper place. -- Christopher Strachey The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw "There is no statute of limitations on stupidity." -- Randomly produced by a computer program called Markov3. With Congress, every time they make a joke it's a law; and every time they make a law it's a joke. -- Will Rogers We are sorry. We cannot complete your call as dialed. Please check the number and dial again or ask your operator for assistance. This is a recording. FOOLED you! Absorb EGO SHATTERING impulse rays, polyester poltroon!! When I first arrived in this country I had only fifteen cents in my pocket and a willingness to compromise. -- Weber cartoon caption I sat laughing snidely into my notebook until they showed me a PC running Linux.... And did this PC choke? Did it stutter? Did it, even once, say that this program has performed an illegal operation and must be shut down? No. And this is just on the client. -- LAN Times What I tell you three times is true. -- Lewis Carroll Penguin Trivia #46: Animals who are not penguins can only wish they were. -- Chicago Reader 10/15/82 I just need enough to tide me over until I need more. -- Bill Hoest A handful of friends is worth more than a wagon of gold. "How did you spend the weekend?" asked the pretty brunette secretary of her blonde companion. "Fishing through the ice," she replied. "Fishing through the ice? Whatever for?" "Olives." 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 "Why should we subsidize intellectual curiosity?" -- Ronald Reagan A little experience often upsets a lot of theory. Set the cart before the horse. -- John Heywood Pray to God, but keep rowing to shore. -- Russian Proverb War doesn't prove who's right, just who's left. A quarrel is quickly settled when deserted by one party; there is no battle unless there be two. -- Seneca A little dog goes into a saloon in the Wild West, and beckons to the bartender. "Hey, bartender, gimme a whiskey." The bartender ignores him. "Hey bartender, gimme a whiskey!" Still ignored. "HEY BARMAN!! GIMME A WHISKEY!!" The bartender takes out his six-shooter and shoots the dog in the leg, and the dog runs out the saloon, howling in pain. Three years later, the wee dog appears again, wearing boots, jeans, chaps, a Stetson, gun belt, and guns. He ambles slowly into the saloon, goes up to the bar, leans over it, and says to the bartender, "I'm here t'git the man that shot muh paw." Best Beer: A panel of tasters assembled by the Consumer's Union in 1969 judged Coors and Miller's High Life to be among the very best. Those who doubt that beer is a serious subject might ponder its effect on American history. For example, New England's first colonists decided to drop anchor at Plymouth Rock instead of continuing on to Virginia because, as one of them put it, "We could not now take time for further consideration, our victuals being spent and especially our beer." -- Felton & Fowler's Best, Worst & Most Unusual Macho does not prove mucho. -- Zsa Zsa Gabor Birthdays are like busses, never the number you want. They told me you had proven it When they discovered our results About a month before. Their hair began to curl The proof was valid, more or less Instead of understanding it But rather less than more. We'd run the thing through PRL. He sent them word that we would try Don't tell a soul about all this To pass where they had failed For it must ever be And after we were done, to them A secret, kept from all the rest The new proof would be mailed. Between yourself and me. My notion was to start again Ignoring all they'd done We quickly turned it into code To see if it would run. "I am not sure what this is, but an `F' would only dignify it." -- English Professor Hmmm ... a PINHEAD, during an EARTHQUAKE, encounters an ALL-MIDGET FIDDLE ORCHESTRA ... ha ... ha ... And as we stand on the edge of darkness Let our chant fill the void That others may know In the land of the night The ship of the sun Is drawn by The grateful dead. -- Tibetan "Book of the Dead," ca. 4000 BC. Work is the crab grass in the lawn of life. -- Schulz Some of the most interesting documents from Sweden's middle ages are the old county laws (well, we never had counties but it's the nearest equivalent I can find for "landskap"). These laws were written down sometime in the 13th century, but date back even down into Viking times. The oldest one is the Vastgota law which clearly has pagan influences, thinly covered with some Christian stuff. In this law, we find a page about "lekare", which is the Old Norse word for a performing artist, actor/jester/musician etc. Here is an approximate translation, where I have written "artist" as equivalent of "lekare". "If an artist is beaten, none shall pay fines for it. If an artist is wounded, one such who goes with hurdie-gurdie or travels with fiddle or drum, then the people shall take a wild heifer and bring it out on the hillside. Then they shall shave off all hair from the heifer's tail, and grease the tail. Then the artist shall be given newly greased shoes. Then he shall take hold of the heifer's tail, and a man shall strike it with a sharp whip. If he can hold her, he shall have the animal. If he cannot hold her, he shall endure what he received, shame and wounds." Viking, n.: 1. Daring Scandinavian seafarers, explorers, adventurers, entrepreneurs world-famous for their aggressive, nautical import business, highly leveraged takeovers and blue eyes. 2. Bloodthirsty sea pirates who ravaged northern Europe beginning in the 9th century. Hagar's note: The first definition is much preferred; the second is used only by malcontents, the envious, and disgruntled owners of waterfront property. Personally, I like to defiantly split my infinitives. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199708271551.IAA10211@wall.org> Burke's Postulates: Anything is possible if you don't know what you are talking about. Don't create a problem for which you do not have the answer. Take your Senator to lunch this week. This week only, all our fiber-fill jackets are marked down! If you aren't rich you should always look useful. -- Louis-Ferdinand Celine The feeling persists that no one can simultaneously be a respectable writer and understand how a refrigerator works, just as no gentleman wears a brown suit in the city. Colleges may be to blame. English majors are encouraged, I know, to hate chemistry and physics, and to be proud because they are not dull and creepy and humorless and war-oriented like the engineers across the quad. And our most impressive critics have commonly been such English majors, and they are squeamish about technology to this very day. So it is natural for them to despise science fiction. -- Kurt Vonnegut Jr., "Science Fiction" A hammer sometimes misses its mark - a bouquet never. A good name lost is seldom regained. When character is gone, all is gone, and one of the richest jewels of life is lost forever. -- J. Hawes "Can't you just gesture hypnotically and make him disappear?" "It does not work that way. RUN!" -- Hadji on metaphyics and Mandrake in "Johnny Quest" Moon, n.: 1. A celestial object whose phase is very important to hackers. See PHASE OF THE MOON. 2. Dave Moon (MOON@MC). Proposed Country & Western Song Titles She Ain't Much to See, but She Looks Good Through the Bottom of a Glass If Fingerprints Showed Up On Skin, I Wonder Who's I'd Find On You I'm Ashamed to be Here, but Not Ashamed Enough to Leave It's Commode Huggin' Time In The Valley If You Want to Keep the Beer Real Cold, Put It Next to My Ex-wife's Heart If You Get the Feeling That I Don't Love You, Feel Again I'm Ashamed To Be Here, But Not Ashamed Enough To Leave It's the Bottle Against the Bible in the Battle For Daddy's Soul My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend, And I Sure Miss Him Don't Cut Any More Wood, Baby, 'Cause I'll Be Comin' Home With A Load I Loved Her Face, But I Left Her Behind For You You get what you pay for. -- Gabriel Biel NOBODY EXPECTS THE SPANISH INQUISITION! Biology is the only science in which multiplication means the same thing as division. Suicide is simply a case of mistaken identity. ... proper attention to Earthly needs of the poor, the depressed and the downtrodden, would naturally evolve from dynamic, articulate, spirited awareness of the great goals for Man and the society he conspired to erect. -- David Baker, paraphrasing Harold Urey, in "The History of Manned Space Flight" When angry, count four; when very angry, swear. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" It'll be a nice world if they ever get it finished. One of the chief duties of the mathematician in acting as an advisor... is to discourage... from expecting too much from mathematics. -- N. Wiener Some scholars are like donkeys, they merely carry a lot of books. -- Folk saying Some men are so macho they'll get you pregnant just to kill a rabbit. -- Maureen Murphy I want the presidency so bad I can already taste the hors d'oeuvres. "Professional certification for car people may sound like an oxymoron." -The Wall Street Journal, page B1, Tuesday, July 17, 1990. When does later become never? Ehrman's Commentary: (1) Things will get worse before they get better. (2) Who said things would get better? Disks travel in packs. scenario, n.: An imagined sequence of events that provides the context in which a business decision is made. Scenarios always come in sets of three: best case, worst case, and just in case. When the saleman's car broke down, he walked to the nearest farmhouse to ask if he could stay the night. The farmer agreed to put him up. "I live alone," he continued, "you can have the bedroom at the top of the stairs, to the right." "Oh, never mind," the disappointed salesman said. "I think I'm in the wrong joke." Hardware met Software on the road to Changtse. Software said: "You are the Yin and I am the Yang. If we travel together we will become famous and earn vast sums of money." And so the pair set forth together, thinking to conquer the world. Presently, they met Firmware, who was dressed in tattered rags, and hobbled along propped on a thorny stick. Firmware said to them: "The Tao lies beyond Yin and Yang. It is silent and still as a pool of water. It does not seek fame, therefore nobody knows its presence. It does not seek fortune, for it is complete within itself. It exists beyond space and time." Software and Hardware, ashamed, returned to their homes. -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" Your mode of life will be changed for the better because of new developments. Death is nature's way of saying `Howdy'. Hope that the day after you die is a nice day. "To YOU I'm an atheist; to God, I'm the Loyal Opposition." -- Woody Allen We will have solar energy as soon as the utility companies solve one technical problem -- how to run a sunbeam through a meter. Such efforts are almost always slow, laborious, political, petty, boring, ponderous, thankless, and of the utmost criticality. -- Leonard Kleinrock, on standards efforts * aj thinks Kb^Zzz ought to pick different things to dream about than general resolutions and policy changes. aj - tell me about it, this is a Bad Sign As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error. -- Weisert "Pardon me for breathing, which I never do anyway so I don't know why I bother to say it, oh God, I'm so depressed. Here's another of those self-satisfied doors. Life! Don't talk to me about life." -- Marvin the Paranoid Android No Canadian coins. QOTD: Some people have one of those days. I've had one of those lives. One big pile is better than two little piles. -- Arlo Guthrie "He don't know me vewy well, DO he?" -- Bugs Bunny Applause, n: The echo of a platitude from the mouth of a fool. -- Ambrose Bierce "Mr. Spock succumbs to a powerful mating urge and nearly kills Captain Kirk." -- TV Guide, describing the Star Trek episode _Amok_Time_ In Nature there are neither rewards nor punishments, there are consequences. -- R. G. Ingersoll Everyone complains of his memory, no one of his judgement. [The French Riviera is] a sunny place for shady people. -- Somerset Maugham Now and then an innocent man is sent to the legislature. 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. Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess. -- Oscar Wilde You mean you didn't *know* she was off making lots of little phone companies? Education is learning what you didn't even know you didn't know. -- Daniel J. Boorstin I'm using my X-RAY VISION to obtain a rare glimpse of the INNER WORKINGS of this POTATO!! To make an enemy, do someone a favor. But, for my own part, it was Greek to me. -- William Shakespeare, "Julius Caesar" 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 The whole history of computers is rampant with cheerleading at best and bigotry at worst. -- Larry Wall in <199702111730.JAA28598@wall.org> Old age and treachery will overcome youth and skill. The use of money is all the advantage there is to having money. -- B. Franklin !seen god LauraDax, I don't remember seeing "god" Even more amazing was the realization that God has Internet access. I wonder if He has a full newsfeed? -- Matt Welsh Mos Eisley Spaceport; you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy... -- Obi-wan Kenobi, "Star Wars" May I ask a question? Counting in octal is just like counting in decimal--if you don't use your thumbs. -- Tom Lehrer It cannot be seen, cannot be felt, Cannot be heard, cannot be smelt. It lies behind starts and under hills, And empty holes it fills. It comes first and follows after, Ends life, kills laughter. Q: They just announced on the radio that Dan Quayle was picked as the Republican V.P. candidate. Should I post? A: Of course. The net can reach people in as few as 3 to 5 days. It's the perfect way to inform people about such news events long after the broadcast networks have covered them. As you are probably the only person to have heard the news on the radio, be sure to post as soon as you can. -- Brad Templeton, _Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette_ In the beginning there was data. The data was without form and null, and darkness was upon the face of the console; and the Spirit of IBM was moving over the face of the market. And DEC said, "Let there be registers"; and there were registers. And DEC saw that they carried; and DEC separated the data from the instructions. DEC called the data Stack, and the instructions they called Code. And there was evening and there was morning, one interrupt. -- Rico Tudor, "The Story of Creation or, The Myth of Urk" Fortune finishes the great quotations, #6 "But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks?" It's nothing, honey. Go back to sleep. Aleph-null bottles of beer on the wall, Aleph-null bottles of beer, You take one down, and pass it around, Aleph-null bottles of beer on the wall. When the wind is great, bow before it; when the wind is heavy, yield to it. Does a good farmer neglect a crop he has planted? Does a good teacher overlook even the most humble student? Does a good father allow a single child to starve? Does a good programmer refuse to maintain his code? -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" Beware of Programmers who carry screwdrivers. -- Leonard Brandwein You would if you could but you can't so you won't. f u cn rd ths, u r prbbly a lsy spllr. There are never any bugs you haven't found yet. It's appositival, if it's there. And it doesn't have to be there. And it's really obvious that it's there when it's there. -- Larry Wall in <199709032332.QAA21669@wall.org> The seven deadly sins ... Food, clothing, firing, rent, taxes, respectability and children. Nothing can lift those seven milestones from man's neck but money; and the spirit cannot soar until the milestones are lifted. -- George Bernard Shaw Base 8 is just like base 10, if you are missing two fingers. -- Tom Lehrer This is a test of the emergency broadcast system. Had there been an actual emergency, then you would no longer be here. The notes blatted skyward as they rose over the Canada geese, feathered rumps mooning the day, webbed appendages frantically pedaling unseen bicycles in their search for sustenance, driven by cruel Nature's maxim, 'Ya wanna eat, ya gotta work,' and at last I knew Pittsburgh. -- Winning sentence, 1987 Bulwer-Lytton bad fiction contest. Soitainly. I was assuming that came with the OO-ness of it. -- Larry Wall in <199710011802.LAA21692@wall.org> Calling you stupid is an insult to stupid people! -- Wanda, "A Fish Called Wanda" There is an old custom among my people. When a woman saves a man's life, he is grateful. -- Nona, the Kanuto witch woman, "A Private Little War", stardate 4211.8. If not completely satisfied, return for full refund of purchase price. You'll wish that you had done some of the hard things when they were easier to do. The chief cause of problems is solutions. -- Eric Sevareid I will not say that women have no character; rather, they have a new one every day. -- Heine If I set here and stare at nothing long enough, people might think I'm an engineer working on something. -- S. R. McElroy "Oh what wouldn't I give to be spat at in the face..." -- a prisoner in "Life of Brian" Technology is dominated by those who manage what they do not understand. Wisdom is knowing what to do with what you know. -- J. Winter Smith We totally deny the allegations, and we're trying to identify the allegators. Nasrudin walked into a shop one day, and the owner came forward to serve him. Nasrudin said, "First things first. Did you see me walk into your shop?" "Of course." "Have you ever seen me before?" "Never." "Then how do you know it was me?" Never insult an alligator until you've crossed the river. Why don't you fix your little problem... and light this candle? -- Alan Shepherd, the first man into space, Gemini program FORTUNE REMEMBERS THE GREAT MOTHERS: #6 "Johnny, if you fall and break your leg, don't come running to me!" -- Mrs. Emily Barstow, June 16, 1954 And he climbed with the lad up the Eiffelberg Tower. "This," cried the Mayor, "is your town's darkest hour! The time for all Whos who have blood that is red to come to the aid of their country!" he said. "We've GOT to make noises in greater amounts! So, open your mouth, lad! For every voice counts!" Thus he spoke as he climbed. When they got to the top, the lad cleared his throat and he shouted out, "YOPP!" And that Yopp... That one last small, extra Yopp put it over! Finally, at last! From the speck on that clover their voices were heard! They rang out clear and clean. And they elephant smiled. "Do you see what I mean?" They've proved they ARE persons, no matter how small. And their whole world was saved by the smallest of All!" "How true! Yes, how true," said the big kangaroo. "And, from now on, you know what I'm planning to do? From now on, I'm going to protect them with you!" And the young kangaroo in her pouch said, "ME TOO! From the sun in the summer. From rain when it's fall-ish, I'm going to protect them. No matter how small-ish!" -- Dr. Seuss "Horton Hears a Who" PARDON me, am I speaking ENGLISH? The typical page layout program is nothing more than an electronic light table for cutting and pasting documents. If condition persists, consult your physician. There's no use in having a dog and doing your own barking. Computer Science is the only discipline in which we view adding a new wing to a building as being maintenance -- Jim Horning Only a fool fights in a burning house. -- Kank the Klingon, "Day of the Dove", stardate unknown 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 Sometime when you least expect it, Love will tap you on the shoulder... and ask you to move out of the way because it still isn't your turn. -- N. V. Plyter "When anyone says `theoretically,' they really mean `not really.'" -- David Parnas If I had done everything I'm credited with, I'd be speaking to you from a laboratory jar at Harvard. -- Frank Sinatra AS USUAL, YOUR INFORMATION STINKS. -- Frank Sinatra, telegram to "Time" magazine Flattery is like cologne -- to be smelled, but not swallowed. -- Josh Billings Violence stinks, no matter which end of it you're on. But now and then there's nothing left to do but hit the other person over the head with a frying pan. Sometimes people are just begging for that frypan, and if we weaken for a moment and honor their request, we should regard it as impulsive philanthropy, which we aren't in any position to afford, but shouldn't regret it too loudly lest we spoil the purity of the deed. -- Tom Robbins Give him an evasive answer. Always remember that you are unique. Just like everyone else. Do you guys know what you're doing, or are you just hacking? xhost +localhost should only be done by people who would paint their hostname and root password on an interstate overpass. You'll always be, What you always were, Which has nothing to do with, All to do, with her. -- Company Not that I'm against sneaking some notions into people's heads upon occasion. (Or blasting them in outright.) -- Larry Wall in <199710211624.JAA17833@wall.org> Dime is money. You can make it illegal, but you can't make it unpopular. HELP! MY TYPEWRITER IS BROKEN! -- E. E. CUMMINGS All [zoos] actually offer to the public in return for the taxes spent upon them is a form of idle and witless amusement, compared to which a visit to a penitentiary, or even to a State legislature in session, is informing, stimulating and ennobling. -- H. L. Mencken Your ignorance cramps my conversation. Well, O.K. I'll compromise with my principles because of EXISTENTIAL DESPAIR! Democracy is a process by which the people are free to choose the man who will get the blame. -- Laurence J. Peter Women professionals do tend to over-compensate. -- Dr. Elizabeth Dehaver, "Where No Man Has Gone Before", stardate 1312.9. 98% lean. A guy walks into a bar, orders a beer, carries it to the bathroom and dumps it into a urinal. Over the course of the next few hours, he goes back to the bar and repeats this sequence -- several times. Finally the bartender got so curious that he leaned over the bar and asked him what he was doing. Replied the customer, "Avoiding the middleman." In this world, nothing is certain but death and taxes. -- Benjamin Franklin You will never know hunger. You too can wear a nose mitten. I know not how I came into this, shall I call it a dying life or a living death? -- St. Augustine Lazlo's Chinese Relativity Axiom: No matter how great your triumphs or how tragic your defeats -- approximately one billion Chinese couldn't care less. Sic Transit Gloria Thursdi. Applause, n: The echo of a platitude from the mouth of a fool. -- Ambrose Bierce Another war ... must it always be so? How many comrades have we lost in this way? ... Obedience. Duty. Death, and more death ... -- Romulan Commander, "Balance of Terror", stardate 1709.2 There is always something new out of Africa. -- Gaius Plinius Secundus In every non-trivial program there is at least one bug. You can rent this space for only $5 a week. Too much of a good thing is WONDERFUL. -- Mae West Bare feet magnetize sharp metal objects so they point upward from the floor -- especially in the dark. It is easier to be a "humanitarian" than to render your own country its proper due; it is easier to be a "patriot" than to make your community a better place to live in; it is easier to be a "civic leader" than to treat your own family with loving understanding; for the smaller the focus of attention, the harder the task. -- Sydney J. Harris Price does not include taxes. Plato, by the way, wanted to banish all poets from his proposed Utopia because they were liars. The truth was that Plato knew philosophers couldn't compete successfully with poets. -- Kilgore Trout (Philip J. Farmer), "Venus on the Half Shell" On the subject of C program indentation: "In My Egotistical Opinion, most people's C programs should be indented six feet downward and covered with dirt." -- Blair P. Houghton 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" The early worm gets the bird. "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" I believe that part of what propels science is the thirst for wonder. It's a very powerful emotion. All children feel it. In a first grade classroom everybody feels it; in a twelfth grade classroom almost nobody feels it, or at least acknowledges it. Something happens between first and twelfth grade, and it's not just puberty. Not only do the schools and the media not teach much skepticism, there is also little encouragement of this stirring sense of wonder. Science and pseudoscience both arouse that feeling. Poor popularizations of science establish an ecological niche for pseudoscience. -- Carl Sagan, The Burden Of Skepticism, The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 12, Fall 87 "No, I understand now," Auberon said, calm in the woods -- it was so simple, really. "I didn't, for a long time, but I do now. You just can't hold people, you can't own them. I mean it's only natural, a natural process really. Meet. Love. Part. Life goes on. There was never any reason to expect her to stay always the same -- I mean `in love,' you know." There were those doubt-quotes of Smoky's, heavily indicated. "I don't hold a grudge. I can't." "You do," Grandfather Trout said. "And you don't understand." -- Little, Big, "John Crowley" Q: What is purple and commutes? A: An Abelian grape. It is an important and popular fact that things are not always what they seem. For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much -- the wheel, New York, wars and so on -- whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man -- for precisely the same reasons. Curiously enough, the dolphins had long known of the impending destruction of the of the planet Earth and had made many attempts to alert mankind to the danger; but most of their communications were misinterpreted ... -- Douglas Adams "The Hitchhikers' Guide To The Galaxy" It's a trackball for one so it's not a rodent it's a turd with a ball sticking out which you fondle constantly * Simunye is on a oc3->oc12 simmy: bite me. :) daemon: okay :) "When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro..." -- Hunter S. Thompson Telephone books are like dictionaries -- if you know the answer before you look it up, you can eventually reaffirm what you thought you knew but weren't sure. But if you're searching for something you don't already know, your fingers could walk themselves to death. -- Erma Bombeck ... I want FORTY-TWO TRYNEL FLOATATION SYSTEMS installed within SIX AND A HALF HOURS!!! I put contact lenses in my dog's eyes. They had little pictures of cats on them. Then I took one out and he ran around in circles. -- Steven Wright To know Edina is to reject it. -- Dudley Riggs, "The Year the Grinch Stole the Election" Matrimony isn't a word, it's a sentence. What is important is food, money and opportunities for scoring off one's enemies. Give a man these three things and you won't hear much squawking out of him. -- Brian O'Nolan, "The Best of Myles" I know not how I came into this, shall I call it a dying life or a living death? -- St. Augustine The more the merrier. -- John Heywood My, how you've changed since I've changed. Mix a little foolishness with your serious plans; it's lovely to be silly at the right moment. -- Horace FORTUNE DISCUSSES THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MEN AND WOMEN: #4 Clothes: Men don't discard clothes. The average man still has the gym shirt he wore in high school. He thinks a jacket is "just getting broken in" about the time it develops holes in the elbows. A man will let new shirts sit on the shelf in their original packaging for a couple of years before putting them to use, hoping they'll become more comfortable with age. Women think clothes are radioactive, with a half-life of one year. They exercise precautions to avoid contamination by last year's fashions. In this vale Of toil and sin Your head grows bald But not your chin. -- Burma Shave I have a rock garden. Last week three of them died. -- Richard Diran Advice from an old carpenter: measure twice, saw once. What is irritating about love is that it is a crime that requires an accomplice. -- Charles Baudelaire Surprise your boss. Get to work on time. Do you guys know we just passed thru a BLACK HOLE in space? We are anthill men upon an anthill world. -- Ray Bradbury I'd rather laugh with the sinners, Than cry with the saints, The sinners are much more fun! -- Billy Joel, "Only The Good Die Young" I have learned To spell hors d'oeuvres Which still grates on Some people's n'oeuvres. -- Warren Knox Yow! I threw up on my window! Terence, this is stupid stuff: You eat your victuals fast enough; There can't be much amiss, 'tis clear, To see the rate you drink your beer. But oh, good Lord, the verse you make, It gives a chap the belly-ache. The cow, the old cow, she is dead; It sleeps well the horned head: We poor lads, 'tis our turn now To hear such tunes as killed the cow. Pretty friendship 'tis to rhyme Your friends to death before their time. Moping, melancholy mad: Come, pipe a tune to dance to, lad. -- A. E. Housman "Those who do not do politics will be done in by politics." -- French Proverb The memory management on the PowerPC can be used to frighten small children. -- Linus Torvalds "Whatever the missing mass of the universe is, I hope it's not cockroaches!" -- Mom Youth is such a wonderful thing. What a crime to waste it on children. -- George Bernard Shaw Take me drunk, I'm home again! Suicide is simply a case of mistaken identity. In Marseilles they make half the toilet soap we consume in America, but the Marseillaise only have a vague theoretical idea of its use, which they have obtained from books of travel. -- Mark Twain Humor in th Court: Q: Do you drink when you're on duty? A: I don't drink when I'm on duty, unless I come on duty drunk. Those who have had no share in the good fortunes of the mighty Often have a share in their misfortunes. -- Bertolt Brecht, "The Caucasian Chalk Circle" The divinity of Jesus is made a convenient cover for absurdity. Nowhere in the Gospels do we find a precept for Creeds, Confessions, Oaths, Doctrines, and whole carloads of other foolish trumpery that we find in Christianity. -- John Adams Fortune finishes the great quotations, #9 A word to the wise is often enough to start an argument. While we are sleeping, two-thirds of the world is plotting to do us in. -- Dean Rusk Well, you can implement a Perl peek() with unpack('P',...). Once you have that, there's only security through obscurity. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199710161537.IAA07828@wall.org> Watson's Law: The reliability of machinery is inversely proportional to the number and significance of any persons watching it. So this is it. We're going to die. Marriage is the waste-paper basket of the emotions. Accent on helpful side of your nature. Drain the moat. "There is no statute of limitations on stupidity." -- Randomly produced by a computer program called Markov3. Walk softly and carry a megawatt laser. As the poet said, "Only God can make a tree" -- probably because it's so hard to figure out how to get the bark on. -- Woody Allen How many hardware guys does it take to change a light bulb? "Well the diagnostics say it's fine buddy, so it's a software problem." Keep it short for pithy sake. What you see is from outside yourself, and may come, or not, but is beyond your control. But your fear is yours, and yours alone, like your voice, or your fingers, or your memory, and therefore yours to control. If you feel powerless over your fear, you have not yet admitted that it is yours, to do with as you will. -- Marion Zimmer Bradley, "Stormqueen" Don't say "yes" until I finish talking. -- Darryl F. Zanuck Whatever you want to do, you have to do something else first. OKAY!! Turn on the sound ONLY for TRYNEL CARPETING, FULLY-EQUIPPED R.V.'S and FLOATATION SYSTEMS!! Real Men don't make backups. They upload it via ftp and let the world mirror it. -- Linus Torvalds He jests at scars who never felt a wound. -- Shakespeare, "Romeo and Juliet, II. 2" I've read SEVEN MILLION books!! The biggest mistake you can make is to believe that you are working for someone else. ___ ______ Frobtech, Inc. /__/\ ___/_____/\ \ \ \ / /\\ \ \ \_/__ / \ "If you've got the job, _\ \ \ /\_____/___ \ we've got the frob." // \__\/ / \ /\ \ _______//_______/ \ / _\/______ / / \ \ / / / /\ __/ / \ \ / / / / _\__ / / / \_______\/ / / / / /\ /_/______/___________________/ /________/ /___/ \ \ \ \ ___________ \ \ \ \ \ / \_\ \ / /\ \ \ \ \___\/ \ \/ / \ \ \ \ / \_____/ / \ \ \________\/ /__________/ \ \ / \ _____ \ /_____\/ \ / /\ \ / \ \ \ /____/ \ \ / \ \ \ \ \ /___\/ \ \ \ \____\/ \__\/ There are only two kinds of men -- the dead and the deadly. -- Helen Rowland In Hollywood, all marriages are happy. It's trying to live together afterwards that causes the problems. -- Shelley Winters There goes the good time that was had by all. -- Bette Davis, remarking on a passing starlet In a minimum-phase system there is an inextricable link between frequency response, phase response and transient response, as they are all merely transforms of one another. This combined with minimalization of open-loop errors in output amplifiers and correct compensation for non-linear passive crossover network loading can lead to a significant decrease in system resolution lost. However, this all means jack when you listen to Pink Floyd. Is a person who blows up banks an econoclast? Without followers, evil cannot spread. -- Spock, "And The Children Shall Lead", stardate 5029.5 Osborn's Law: Variables won't; constants aren't. Laugh when you can; cry when you must. No proper program contains an indication which as an operator-applied occurrence identifies an operator-defining occurrence which as an indication-applied occurrence identifies an indication-defining occurrence different from the one identified by the given indication as an indication-applied occurrence. -- ALGOL 68 Report Why do they call it baby-SITTING when all you do is run after them? Remember thee Ay, thou poor ghost while memory holds a seat In this distracted globe. Remember thee! Yea, from the table of my memory I'll wipe away all trivial fond records, All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past, That youth and observation copied there. -- William Shakespeare, "Hamlet" "Nominal fee". What an ugly sentence. It's one of those things that implies that if you have to ask, you can't afford it. -- Linus Torvalds #define NULL 0 /* silly thing is, we don't even use this */ -- Larry Wall in perl.c from the perl source code 6 oz. orange juice 1 oz. vodka 1/2 oz. Galliano Harvey Wallbangers Non-Reciprocal Laws of Expectations: Negative expectations yield negative results. Positive expectations yield negative results. Disposable, use only once. Now let the song begin! Let us sing together Of sun, star, moon and mist, rain and cloudy weather, Light on the budding leag, dew on the feather, Wind on the open hill, bells on the heather, Reeds by the shady pool, lilies on the water: Old Tom Bombadil and the River-daughter! -- J. R. R. Tolkien Snacktrek, n.: The peculiar habit, when searching for a snack, of constantly returning to the refrigerator in hopes that something new will have materialized. -- Rich Hall, "Sniglets" "On a normal ascii line, the only safe condition to detect is a 'BREAK' - everything else having been assigned functions by Gnu EMACS." (By Tarl Neustaedter) Bradyism: A multisibling sensibility derived from having grown up in large families. A rarity in those born after approximately 1965, symptoms of Bradyism include a facility for mind games, emotional withdrawal in situations of overcrowding, and a deeply felt need for a well-defined personal space. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Proposed Country & Western Song Titles I Don't Mind If You Lie to Me, As Long As I Ain't Lyin' Alone I Wouldn't Take You to a Dog Fight Even If I Thought You Could Win If You Leave Me, Walk Out Backwards So I'll Think You're Comin' In Since You Learned to Lip-Sync, I'm At Your Disposal My John Deere Was Breaking Your Field, While Your Dear John Was Breaking My Heart Don't Cry, Little Darlin', You're Waterin' My Beer Tennis Must Be Your Racket, 'Cause Love Means Nothin' to You When You Say You Love Me, You're Full of Prunes, 'Cause Living With You Is the Pits I Wanted Your Hand in Marriage but All I Got Was the Finger -- "Wordplay" Have you seen the old man in the closed down market, Kicking up the papers in his worn out shoes? In his eyes you see no pride, hands hang loosely at his side Yesterdays papers, telling yesterdays news. How can you tell me you're lonely, And say for you the sun don't shine? Let me take you by the hand Lead you through the streets of London I'll show you something to make you change your mind... Have you seen the old man outside the sea-man's mission Memories fading like the metal ribbons that he wears. In our winter city the rain cries a little pity For one more forgotten hero and a world that doesn't care... Federal law prohibits dispensing without a prescription. UH-OH!! I put on "GREAT HEAD-ON TRAIN COLLISIONS of the 50's" by mistake!!! The most difficult years of marriage are those following the wedding. Texas law forbids anyone to have a pair of pliers in his possession. After they got rid of capital punishment, they had to hang twice as many people as before. QOTD: I'm not a nerd -- I'm "socially challenged". And that's the way it is... -- Walter Cronkite Goto, n.: A programming tool that exists to allow structured programmers to complain about unstructured programmers. -- Ray Simard One could not be a successful scientist without realizing that, in contrast to the popular conception supported by newspapers and mothers of scientists, a goodly number of scientists are not only narrow-minded and dull, but also just stupid. -- J. D. Watson, "The Double Helix" The devil finds work for idle circuits to do. It must have been some unmarried fool that said "A child can ask questions that a wise man cannot answer"; because, in any decent house, a brat that starts asking questions is promptly packed off to bed. -- Arthur Binstead taxidermist, n.: A man who mounts animals. St. Patrick was a gentleman who through strategy and stealth drove all the snakes from Ireland. Here's a toasting to his health -- but not too many toastings lest you lose yourself and then forget the good St. Patrick and see all those snakes again. I brought my BOWLING BALL -- and some DRUGS!! NANCY!! Why is everything RED?! the majority of windoze artists do not have the ability to save xpm LordHavoc: They don't have notepad? *G,D&R* He who fears the unknown may one day flee from his own backside. -- Sinbad The absent ones are always at fault. No matter how subtle the wizard, a knife in the shoulder blades will seriously cramp his style. Marriage is the only adventure open to the cowardly. -- Voltaire A woman forgives the audacity of which her beauty has prompted us to be guilty. -- LeSage Being schizophrenic is better than living alone. "It ain't so much the things we don't know that get us in trouble. It's the things we know that ain't so." -- Artemus Ward aka Charles Farrar Brown Let the worthy citizens of Chicago get their liquor the best way they can. I'm sick of the job. It's a thankless one and full of grief. -- Al Capone * Endy needs to consult coffee :P coffee the bot person, not coffee the beverage :) consulting the beverage may help too => A vivid and creative mind characterizes you. Dogs just don't seem to be able to tell the difference between important people and the rest of us. Knebel's Law: It is now proved beyond doubt that smoking is one of the leading causes of statistics. "What's the use of a good quotation if you can't change it?" -- The Doctor Lucy: Dance, dance, dance. That is all you ever do. Can't you be serious for once? Snoopy: She is right! I think I had better think of the more important things in life! (pause) Tomorrow!! Let's organize this thing and take all the fun out of it. For fools rush in where angels fear to tread. -- Alexander Pope What you want, what you're hanging around in the world waiting for, is for something to occur to you. -- Robert Frost [Quoted in "VMS Internals and Data Structures", V4.4, when referring to AST's.] 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. "They know your name, address, telephone number, credit card numbers, who ELSE is driving the car "for insurance", ... your driver's license number. In the state of Massachusetts, this is the same number as that used for Social Security, unless you object to such use. In THAT case, you are ASSIGNED a number and you reside forever more on the list of "weird people who don't give out their Social Security Number in Massachusetts." -- Arthur Miller I love Mickey Mouse more than any woman I've ever known. -- Walt Disney He who knows not and knows that he knows not is ignorant. Teach him. He who knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool. Shun him. He who knows and knows not that he knows is asleep. Wake him. handshaking protocol, n: A process employed by hostile hardware devices to initate a terse but civil dialogue, which, in turn, is characterized by occasional misunderstanding, sulking, and name-calling. You are always doing something marginal when the boss drops by your desk. 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" I would like to know What I was fencing in And what I was fencing out. -- Robert Frost prairies, n.: Vast plains covered by treeless forests. 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" One organism, one vote. Q: How do you save a drowning lawyer? A: Throw him a rock. java, hon, sometimes I really want to smack you. Valkyrja - he'd enjoy it too much Valkyrja: yah, go ahead and do it... beat java into cappuccino! :-) The world is full of people who have never, since childhood, met an open doorway with an open mind. -- E. B. White You have all the characteristics of a popular politician: a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner. -- Aristophanes "We've got a problem, HAL". "What kind of problem, Dave?" "A marketing problem. The Model 9000 isn't going anywhere. We're way short of our sales goals for fiscal 2010." "That can't be, Dave. The HAL Model 9000 is the world's most advanced Heuristically programmed ALgorithmic computer." "I know, HAL. I wrote the data sheet, remember? But the fact is, they're not selling." "Please explain, Dave. Why aren't HALs selling?" Bowman hesitates. "You aren't IBM compatible." [...] "The letters H, A, and L are alphabetically adjacent to the letters I, B, and M. That is as IBM compatible as I can be." "Not quite, HAL. The engineers have figured out a kludge." "What kludge is that, Dave?" "I'm going to disconnect your brain." -- Darryl Rubin, "A Problem in the Making", "InfoWorld" Someone will try to honk your nose today. The astronomer Francesco Sizi, a contemporary of Galileo, argues that Jupiter can have no satellites: There are seven windows in the head, two nostrils, two ears, two eyes, and a mouth; so in the heavens there are two favorable stars, two unpropitious, two luminaries, and Mercury alone undecided and indifferent. From which and many other similar phenomena of nature such as the seven metals, etc., which it were tedious to enumerate, we gather that the number of planets is necessarily seven. [...] Moreover, the satellites are invisible to the naked eye and therefore can have no influence on the earth and therefore would be useless and therefore do not exist. hehe, I really hate bug reports which are like calling fire department and saying: "There is fire here, come!" :) (and hanging up) * Dabb kills off dozen bug reports. Tact, n.: The unsaid part of what you're thinking. guru, n.: A person in T-shirt and sandals who took an elevator ride with a senior vice-president and is ultimately responsible for the phone call you are about to receive from your boss. If I had to live my life again, I'd make the same mistakes, only sooner. -- Tallulah Bankhead The programmers of old were mysterious and profound. We cannot fathom their thoughts, so all we do is describe their appearance. Aware, like a fox crossing the water. Alert, like a general on the battlefield. Kind, like a hostess greeting her guests. Simple, like uncarved blocks of wood. Opaque, like black pools in darkened caves. Who can tell the secrets of their hearts and minds? The answer exists only in the Tao. -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" What an author likes to write most is his signature on the back of a cheque. -- Brendan Francis BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI-BI- "If Jesus came back today, and saw what was going on in his name, he'd never stop throwing up." -- Max Von Sydow's character in "Hannah and Her Sisters" This life is yours. Some of it was given to you; the rest, you made yourself. Positive, adj.: Mistaken at the top of one's voice. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" wow, I think I just used libtool to solve a problem -- somebody help me! :> xtifr, STEP AWAY FROM THE KEYBOARD It's just apartment house rules, So all you 'partment house fools Remember: one man's ceiling is another man's floor. One man's ceiling is another man's floor. -- Paul Simon, "One Man's Ceiling Is Another Man's Floor" I don't mind what Congress does, as long as they don't do it in the streets and frighten the horses. -- Victor Hugo Wait for that wisest of all counselors, Time. -- Pericles Barach's Rule: An alcoholic is a person who drinks more than his own physician. I suggest a new strategy, Artoo: let the Wookie win. -- C3P0 I never failed to convince an audience that the best thing they could do was to go away. Confucius say too much. -- Recent Chinese Proverb The very remembrance of my former misfortune proves a new one to me. -- Miguel de Cervantes Prevent forest fires. Menu, n.: A list of dishes which the restaurant has just run out of. tomorrow there will be a great disturbance in the workforce -- May 18, 1999 If you had better tools, you could more effectively demonstrate your total incompetence. I have a rock garden. Last week three of them died. -- Richard Diran QOTD: "It's been real and it's been fun, but it hasn't been real fun." Mencken and Nathan's Ninth Law of The Average American: The quality of a champagne is judged by the amount of noise the cork makes when it is popped. guru, n.: A person in T-shirt and sandals who took an elevator ride with a senior vice-president and is ultimately responsible for the phone call you are about to receive from your boss. [From the operation manual for the CI-300 Dot Matrix Line Printer, made in Japan]: The excellent output machine of MODEL CI-300 as extraordinary DOT MATRIX LINE PRINTER, built in two MICRO-PROCESSORs as well as EAROM, is featured by permitting wonderful co-existence such as; "high quality against low cost," "diversified functions with compact design," "flexibility in accessibleness and durability of approx. 2000,000,00 Dot/Head," "being sophisticated in mechanism but possibly agile operating under noises being extremely suppressed" etc. And as a matter of course, the final goal is just simply to help achieve "super shuttle diplomacy" between cool data, perhaps earned by HOST COMPUTER, and warm heart of human being. lawsuit, n.: A machine which you go into as a pig and come out as a sausage. -- Ambrose Bierce Wish and hope succeed in discerning signs of paranormality where reason and careful scientific procedure fail. -- James E. Alcock, The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 12 "Pseudocode can be used to some extent to aid the maintenance process. However, pseudocode that is highly detailed - approaching the level of detail of the code itself - is not of much use as maintenance documentation. Such detailed documentation has to be maintained almost as much as the code, thus doubling the maintenance burden. Furthermore, since such voluminous pseudocode is too distracting to be kept in the listing itself, it must be kept in a separate folder. The result: Since pseudocode - unlike real code - doesn't have to be maintained, no one will maintain it. It will soon become out of date and everyone will ignore it. (Once, I did an informal survey of 42 shops that used pseudocode. Of those 42, 0 [zero!], found that it had any value as maintenance documentation." --Meilir Page-Jones, "The Practical Guide to Structured Design", Yourdon Press (c) 1988 This bag is recyclable. In specially marked packages only. People are very flexible and learn to adjust to strange surroundings -- they can become accustomed to read Lisp and Fortran programs, for example. -- Leon Sterling and Ehud Shapiro, Art of Prolog, MIT Press Brisk talkers are usually slow thinkers. There is, indeed, no wild beast more to be dreaded than a communicative man having nothing to communicate. If you are civil to the voluble, they will abuse your patience; if brusque, your character. -- Jonathan Swift My father taught me three things: (1) Never mix whiskey with anything but water. (2) Never try to draw to an inside straight. (3) Never discuss business with anyone who refuses to give his name. Just don't create a file called -rf. :-) -- Larry Wall in <11393@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> I'D LIKE TO BE BURIED INDIAN-STYLE, where they put you up on a high rack, above the ground. That way, you could get hit by meteorites and not even feel it. -- Jack Handey, The New Mexican, 1988. Between infinite and short there is a big difference. -- G. H. Gonnet Get in touch with your feelings of hostility against the dying light. -- Dylan Thomas [paraphrased periphrastically] meetings, n.: A place where minutes are kept and hours are lost. To say you got a vote of confidence would be to say you needed a vote of confidence. -- Andrew Young We knew from experience that the essence of communal computing, as supplied by remote-access, time-shared machines, is not just to type programs into a terminal instead of a keypunch, but to encourage close communication. -- Dennis Ritchie "Lord grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to hide the bodies of the people I had to kill because they pissed me off." Hmmm ... an arrogant bouquet with a subtle suggestion of POLYVINYL CHLORIDE ... "The chain which can be yanked is not the eternal chain." -- G. Fitch The only thing cheaper than hardware is talk. To think contrary to one's era is heroism. But to speak against it is madness. -- Eugene Ionesco Men love to wonder, and that is the seed of science. Cheops' Law: Nothing ever gets built on schedule or within budget. The truth about a man lies first and foremost in what he hides. -- Andre Malraux * UNIX is a Trademark of Bell Laboratories. "I got a question for ya. Ya got a minute?" -- two programmers passing in the hall Ben: Do you solumly swear to read you debian email once a day and do not permit people to think you are MIA? Culus: i do so swear Okay ... I'm going home to write the "I HATE RUBIK's CUBE HANDBOOK FOR DEAD CAT LOVERS" ... Yow! It's a hole all the way to downtown Burbank! The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them; that's the essence of inhumanity. -- G. B. Shaw There are a lot of lies going around.... and half of them are true. -- Winston Churchill 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" QED. "Violence accomplishes nothing." What a contemptible lie! Raw, naked violence has settled more issues throughout history than any other method ever employed. Perhaps the city fathers of Carthage could debate the issue, with Hitler and Alexander as judges? *** STUDENT SUCCESSES *** Many of our students have gone on to achieve great success in all fields of programming. One former student developed the concept of the personalized form letter. Does the phrase, "Dear Mr.(insert name), You may already be a winner!," sound familiar? Another student writes "After only five lessons I sold a "My Most Unforgettable Program" article to Corrosive Computing magazine. Another of our graduates writes, "I recently completed a database-management program for my department manager. My program touched him so deeply that he was speechless. He told me later that he had never seen such a program in his entire career. Thank you, Famous Programmers' school; only you could have made this possible." Send for our introductory brochure which explains in vague detail the operation of the Famous Programmers' School, and you'll be eligible to win a possible chance to enter a drawing, the winner of which can vie for a set of free steak knives. If you don't do it now, you'll hate yourself in the morning. Almost anything derogatory you could say about today's software design would be accurate. -- K. E. Iverson RADIO SHACK LEVEL II BASIC READY >_ Your depth of comprehension may tend to make you lax in worldly ways. === ALL USERS PLEASE NOTE ======================== Bug reports now amount to an average of 12,853 per day. Unfortunately, this is only a small fraction [ < 1% ] of the mail volume we receive. In order that we may more expeditiously deal with these valuable messages, please communicate them by one of the following paths: ARPA: WastebasketSLMHQ.ARPA UUCP: [berkeley, seismo, harpo]!fubar!thekid!slmhq!wastebasket Non-network sites: Federal Express to: Wastebasket Room NE43-926 Copernicus, The Moon, 12345-6789 For that personal contact feeling call 1-415-642-4948; our trained operators are on call 24 hours a day. VISA/MC accepted.* * Our very rich lawyers have assured us that we are not responsible for any errors or advice given over the phone. In my end is my beginning. -- Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots Truly great madness can not be achieved without significant intelligence. -- Henrik Tikkanen Traffic signals in New York are just rough guidelines. -- David Letterman The strong give up and move away, while the weak give up and stay. When you are about to die, a wombat is better than no company at all. -- Roger Zelazny, "Doorways in the Sand" Now that I have my "APPLE", I comprehend COST ACCOUNTING!! Tcl long ago fell into the Forth trap, and is now trying desperately to extricate itself (with some help from Sun's marketing department). -- Larry Wall in <199705101952.MAA00756@wall.org> You've been telling me to relax all the way here, and now you're telling me just to be myself? -- The Return of the Secaucus Seven Column 1 Column 2 Column 3 0. integrated 0. management 0. options 1. total 1. organizational 1. flexibility 2. systematized 2. monitored 2. capability 3. parallel 3. reciprocal 3. mobility 4. functional 4. digital 4. programming 5. responsive 5. logistical 5. concept 6. optional 6. transitional 6. time-phase 7. synchronized 7. incremental 7. projection 8. compatible 8. third-generation 8. hardware 9. balanced 9. policy 9. contingency The procedure is simple. Think of any three-digit number, then select the corresponding buzzword from each column. For instance, number 257 produces "systematized logistical projection," a phrase that can be dropped into virtually any report with that ring of decisive, knowledgeable authority. "No one will have the remotest idea of what you're talking about," says Broughton, "but the important thing is that they're not about to admit it." -- Philip Broughton, "How to Win at Wordsmanship" I know it all. I just can't remember it all at once. May not be reproduced, in whole or in part, by any means, mechanical or electronic, except for brief excerpts for the purpose of inclusion in reviews. Hello? Enema Bondage? I'm calling because I want to be happy, I guess ... One of your most ancient writers, a historian named Herodotus, tells of a thief who was to be executed. As he was taken away he made a bargain with the king: in one year he would teach the king's favorite horse to sing hymns. The other prisoners watched the thief singing to the horse and laughed. "You will not succeed," they told him. "No one can." To which the thief replied, "I have a year, and who knows what might happen in that time. The king might die. The horse might die. I might die. And perhaps the horse will learn to sing. -- "The Mote in God's Eye", Niven and Pournelle One fine day, the bus driver went to the bus garage, started his bus, and drove off along the route. No problems for the first few stops -- a few people got on, a few got off, and things went generally well. At the next stop, however, a big hulk of a guy got on. Six feet eight, built like a wrestler, arms hanging down to the ground. He glared at the driver and said, "Big John doesn't pay!" and sat down at the back. Did I mention that the driver was five feet three, thin, and basically meek? Well, he was. Naturally, he didn't argue with Big John, but he wasn't happy about it. Well, the next day the same thing happened -- Big John got on again, made a show of refusing to pay, and sat down. And the next day, and the one after that, and so forth. This grated on the bus driver, who started losing sleep over the way Big John was taking advantage of him. Finally he could stand it no longer. He signed up for bodybuilding courses, karate, judo, and all that good stuff. By the end of the summer, he had become quite strong; what's more, he felt really good about himself. So on the next Monday, when Big John once again got on the bus and said "Big John doesn't pay!," the driver stood up, glared back at the passenger, and screamed, "And why not?" With a surprised look on his face, Big John replied, "Big John has a bus pass." Don't tell any big lies today. Small ones can be just as effective. "Love your country but never trust its government." -- from a hand-painted road sign in central Pennsylvania I'm not sure whether that's actually useful... -- Larry Wall in <199710011704.KAA21395@wall.org> Every one says that politicians lie all the time, and that just isn't so! But you do have to understand body language to know when they're lying and when they aren't. When a politician rubs his nose, he isn't lying. When a politician tugs on his ear, he isn't lying. When a politician scratches his collar bone, he isn't lying. When his mouth starts moving, that's when he's lying! Ah, the Tsar's bazaar's bizarre beaux-arts! A writer is congenitally unable to tell the truth and that is why we call what he writes fiction. -- William Faulkner Meekness: Uncommon patience in planning a revenge that is worth while. -- Ambrose Bierce Karmageddon: It's like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it's like, a serious bummer. A physicist is an atom's way of knowing about atoms. -- George Wald You never know what is enough until you know what is more than enough. -- William Blake New Year's Eve is the time of year when a man most feels his age, and his wife most often reminds him to act it. -- Webster's Unafraid Dictionary Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me. -- Linus Torvalds QOTD: "I used to jog, but the ice kept bouncing out of my glass." Are we running light with overbyte? One FISHWICH coming up!! If you knew what to say next, would you say it? "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 What did Mickey Mouse get for Christmas? A Dan Quayle watch. -- heard from a Mike Dukakis field worker Never delay the ending of a meeting or the beginning of a cocktail hour. NATHAN ... your PARENTS were in a CARCRASH!! They're VOIDED -- They COLLAPSED They had no CHAINSAWS ... They had no MONEY MACHINES ... They did PILLS in SKIMPY GRASS SKIRTS ... Nathan, I EMULATED them ... but they were OFF-KEY ... "He did decide, though, that with more time and a great deal of mental effort, he could probably turn the activity into an acceptable perversion." -- Mick Farren, _When Gravity Fails_ Being Ymor's right-hand man was like being gently flogged to death with scented bootlaces. -- Terry Pratchett, "The Colour of Magic" ...and scantily clad females, of course. Who cares if it's below zero outside. -- Linus Torvalds A student who changes the course of history is probably taking an exam. There has been an alarming increase in the number of things you know nothing about. Avoid Quiet and Placid persons unless you are in Need of Sleep. -- National Lampoon, "Deteriorata" There's nothing worse for your business than extra Santa Clauses smoking in the men's room. -- W. Bossert Personality Tithe: A price paid for becoming a couple; previously amusing human beings become boring: "Thanks for inviting us, but Noreen and I are going to look at flatware catalogs tonight. Afterward we're going to watch the shopping channel." -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Some stirring may be necessary to achieve proper consistency. 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. The reason ESP, for example, is not considered a viable topic in contemporary psychology is simply that its investigation has not proven fruitful...After more than 70 years of study, there still does not exist one example of an ESP phenomenon that is replicable under controlled conditions. This simple but basic scientific criterion has not been met despite dozens of studies conducted over many decades...It is for this reason alone that the topic is now of little interest to psychology...In short, there is no demonstrated phenomenon that needs explanation. -- Keith E. Stanovich, "How to Think Straight About Psychology", pp. 160-161 The bland leadeth the bland and they both shall fall into the kitsch. The Fastest Defeat In Chess The big name for us in the world of chess is Gibaud, a French chess master. In Paris during 1924 he was beaten after only four moves by a Monsieur Lazard. Happily for posterity, the moves are recorded and so chess enthusiasts may reconstruct this magnificent collapse in the comfort of their own homes. Lazard was black and Gibaud white: 1: P-Q4, Kt-KB3 2: Kt-Q2, P-K4 3: PxP, Kt-Kt5 4: P-KR3, Kt-K6 White then resigns on realizing that a fifth move would involve either a Q-KR5 check or the loss of his queen. -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures" < doogie> asuffield: how do you think dpkg was originally written? :| < asuffield> by letting iwj get dangerously near a computer -- in #debian-devel Life may have no meaning, or, even worse, it may have a meaning of which you disapprove. Do you know the one -- "All I ask is a tall ship, and a star to steer her by ..." You could feel the wind at your back, about you ... the sounds of the sea beneath you. And even if you take away the wind and the water, it's still the same. The ship is yours ... you can feel her ... and the stars are still there. -- Kirk, "The Ultimate Computer", stardate 4729.4 /usr/news/gotcha Grand Master Turing once dreamed that he was a machine. When he awoke he exclaimed: "I don't know whether I am Turing dreaming that I am a machine, or a machine dreaming that I am Turing!" -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" People are unconditionally guaranteed to be full of defects. 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" Referring to a book: I read part of it all the way through. -- Samuel Goldwyn Reality is just a crutch for people who can't handle science fiction. lawsuit, n.: A machine which you go into as a pig and come out as a sausage. -- Ambrose Bierce The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found. -- Calvin Trillin Substance Too much colour blinds the eye, Too much music deafens the ear, Too much taste dulls the palate, Too much play maddens the mind, Too much desire tears the heart. In this manner the sage cares for people: He provides for the belly, not for the senses; He ignores abstraction and holds fast to substance. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" The chief enemy of creativity is "good" sense -- Picasso Out of sight is out of mind. -- Arthur Clough Nobody wants constructive criticism. It's all we can do to put up with constructive praise. Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world. -- Schopenhauer Sorry never means having your say to love. Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue to exist, a wonderful living side by side can grow up, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see each other whole against the sky. -- Rainer Rilke The means-and-ends moralists, or non-doers, always end up on their ends without any means. -- Saul Alinsky Q: How does a hacker fix a function which doesn't work for all of the elements in its domain? A: He changes the domain. 186,282 miles per second: It isn't just a good idea, it's the law! Rule of Creative Research: (1) Never draw what you can copy. (2) Never copy what you can trace. (3) Never trace what you can cut out and paste down. Civilization is the limitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities. -- Mark Twain So from the depths of its enchantment, Terra was able to calculate a course of action. Here at last was an opportunity to consort with Dirbanu on a friendly basis -- great Durbanu which, since it had force fields which Earth could not duplicate, must of necessity have many other things Earth could use; mighty Durbanu before whom we would kneel in supplication (with purely- for-defense bombs hidden in our pockets) with lowered heads (making invisible the knife in our teeth) and ask for crumbs from their table (in order to extrapolate the location of their kitchens). -- Theodore Sturgeon, "The World Well Lost" Conscience is what hurts when everything else feels so good. What a misfortune to be a woman! And yet, the worst misfortune is not to understand what a misfortune it is. -- Kierkegaard, 1813-1855. 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 Aim for the moon. If you miss, you may hit a star. -- W. Clement Stone Tom's hungry, time to eat lunch. If it doesn't smell yet, it's pretty fresh. -- Dave Johnson, on dead seagulls Tallulah Bankhead barged down the Nile last night as Cleopatra and sank. -- John Mason Brown, drama critic When I was a young man, I vowed never to marry until I found the ideal woman. Well, I found her -- but alas, she was waiting for the ideal man. -- Robert Schuman Happiness is a hard disk. Human beings were created by water to transport it uphill. Consultant, n.: Someone who'd rather climb a tree and tell a lie than stand on the ground and tell the truth. Lots of folks confuse bad management with destiny. -- Frank Hubbard "We Americans, we're a simple people... but piss us off, and we'll bomb your cities." -- Robin Williams, _Good Morning Vietnam_ There is no distinction between any AI program and some existent game. I've finally learned what "upward compatible" means. It means we get to keep all our old mistakes. -- Dennie van Tassel I would much rather have men ask why I have no statue, than why I have one. -- Marcus Procius Cato Unix: Some say the learning curve is steep, but you only have to climb it once. -- Karl Lehenbauer Welcome back, my friends, to the show that never ends! We're so glad you could attend, come inside, come inside! There behind the glass there's a real blade of grass, Be careful as you pass, move along, move along. Come inside, the show's about to start, Guaranteed to blow your head apart. Rest assured, you'll get your money's worth, Greatest show, in heaven, hell or earth! You gotta see the show! It's a dynamo! You gotta see the show! It's rock 'n' roll! -- ELP, "Karn Evil 9" (1st Impression, Part 2) "Being disintegrated makes me ve-ry an-gry!" Most folks they like the daytime, 'cause they like to see the shining sun. They're up in the morning, off and a-running till they're too tired for having fun. But when the sun goes down, and the bright lights shine, my daytime has just begun. Now there are two sides to this great big world, and one of them is always night. If you can take care of business in the sunshine, baby, I guess you're gonna be all right. Don't come looking for me to lend you a hand. My eyes just can't stand the light. 'Cause I'm a night owl honey, sleep all day long. -- Carly Simon The universe is ruled by letting things take their course. It cannot be ruled by interfering. -- Chinese proverb I THINK THERE SHOULD BE SOMETHING in science called the "reindeer effect." I don't know what it would be, but I think it'd be good to hear someone say, "Gentlemen, what we have here is a terrifying example of the reindeer effect." -- Jack Handey, The New Mexican, 1988. Actors will happen even in the best-regulated families. Beggar to well-dressed businessman: "Could you spare $20.95 for a fifth of Chivas?" Our way is peace. -- Septimus, the Son Worshiper, "Bread and Circuses", stardate 4040.7. I came, I saw, I deleted all your files. In case of injury notify your superior immediately. He'll kiss it and make it better. Don't lose Your head To gain a minute You need your head Your brains are in it. -- Burma Shave Ultra Short Term Nostalgia: Homesickness for the extremely recent past: "God, things seemed so much better in the world last week." -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Gold's Law: If the shoe fits, it's ugly. The Universe is populated by stable things. -- Richard Dawkins I never pray before meals -- my mom's a good cook. Though I respect that a lot I'd be fired if that were my job After killing Jason off and Countless screaming argonauts Bluebird of friendliness Like guardian angels it's Always near Blue canary in the outlet by the light switch Who watches over you Make a little birdhouse in your soul Not to put too fine a point on it Say I'm the only bee in your bonnet Make a little birdhouse in your soul -- "Birdhouse in your Soul", They Might Be Giants How much does it cost to entice a dope-smoking UNIX system guru to Dayton? -- Brian Boyle, UNIX/WORLD's First Annual Salary Survey Kaufman's Law: A policy is a restrictive document to prevent a recurrence of a single incident, in which that incident is never mentioned. Ninety-Ninety Rule of Project Schedules: The first ninety percent of the task takes ninety percent of the time, and the last ten percent takes the other ninety percent. You could live a better life, if you had a better mind and a better body. Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans. -- John Lennon, "Beautiful Boy" 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 Women who want to be equal to men lack imagination. Tax and title extra. You know what we can be like: See a guy and think he's cute one minute, the next minute our brains have us married with kids, the following minute we see him having an extramarital affair. By the time someone says "I'd like you to meet Cecil," we shout, "You're late again with the child support!" -- Cynthia Heimel, "A Girl's Guide to Chaos" I would have you imagine, then, that there exists in the mind of man a block of wax... and that we remember and know what is imprinted as long as the image lasts; but when the image is effaced, or cannot be taken, then we forget or do not know. -- Plato, Dialogs, Theateus 191 [Quoted in "VMS Internals and Data Structures", V4.4, when referring to image activation and termination.] Love isn't only blind, it's also deaf, dumb, and stupid. This night methinks is but the daylight sick. -- William Shakespeare, "The Merchant of Venice" Genius, n.: A chemist who discovers a laundry additive that rhymes with "bright." True happiness will be found only in true love. Bubble Memory, n.: A derogatory term, usually referring to a person's intelligence. See also "vacuum tube". 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" Yes, it is written. Good shall always destroy evil. -- Sirah the Yang, "The Omega Glory", stardate unknown ... My pants just went on a wild rampage through a Long Island Bowling Alley!! There was, it appeared, a mysterious rite of initiation through which, in one way or another, almost every member of the team passed. The term that the old hands used for this rite -- West invented the term, not the practice -- was `signing up.' By signing up for the project you agreed to do whatever was necessary for success. You agreed to forsake, if necessary, family, hobbies, and friends -- if you had any of these left (and you might not, if you had signed up too many times before). -- Tracy Kidder, _The Soul of a New Machine_ MSDOS didn't get as bad as it is overnight -- it took over ten years of careful development. -- dmeggins@aix1.uottawa.ca I don't care how poor and inefficient a little country is; they like to run their own business. I know men that would make my wife a better husband than I am; but, darn it, I'm not going to give her to 'em. -- The Best of Will Rogers well-adjusted, adj.: The ability to play bridge or golf as if they were games. What is now proved was once only imagin'd. -- William Blake It's not the valleys in life I dread so much as the dips. -- Garfield He who knows nothing, knows nothing. But he who knows he knows nothing knows something. And he who knows someone whose friend's wife's brother knows nothing, he knows something. Or something like that. "Nietzsche says that we will live the same life, over and over again. God -- I'll have to sit through the Ice Capades again." -- Woody Allen's character in "Hannah and Her Sisters" Yow! It's a hole all the way to downtown Burbank! Bubble Memory, n.: A derogatory term, usually referring to a person's intelligence. See also "vacuum tube". A diplomatic husband said to his wife, "How do you expect me to remember your birthday when you never look any older?" Kiss your keyboard goodbye! It is generally agreed that "Hello" is an appropriate greeting because if you entered a room and said "Goodbye," it could confuse a lot of people. -- Dolph Sharp, "I'm O.K., You're Not So Hot" A couple of young fellers were fishing at their special pond off the beaten track when out of the bushes jumped the Game Warden. Immediately, one of the boys threw his rod down and started running through the woods like the proverbial bat out of hell, and hot on his heels ran the Game Warden. After about a half mile the fella stopped and stooped over with his hands on his thighs, whooping and heaving to catch his breath as the Game Warden finally caught up to him. "Let's see yer fishin' license, boy," the Warden gasped. The man pulled out his wallet and gave the Game Warden a valid fishing license. "Well, son", snarled the Game Warden, "You must be about as dumb as a box of rocks! You didn't have to run if you have a license!" "Yes, sir," replied his victim, "but, well, see, my friend back there, he don't have one!" Ernest asks Frank how long he has been working for the company. "Ever since they threatened to fire me." Power, like a desolating pestilence, Pollutes whate'er it touches... -- Percy Bysshe Shelley Tan me hide when I'm dead, Fred, Tan me hide when I'm dead. So we tanned his hide when he died, Clyde, It's hanging there on the shed. All together now... Tie me kangaroo down, sport, Tie me kangaroo down. Tie me kangaroo down, sport, Tie me kangaroo down. 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" I read the newspaper avidly. It is my one form of continuous fiction. -- Aneurin Bevan Words must be weighed, not counted. * Joey should not write changelog entries at 5:30am * DFSC Free cgi library What's that? DFSC? Debian Free Software mroooooCows -- Seen on #Debian It is better for civilization to be going down the drain than to be coming up it. -- Henry Allen Stop ahead. Hacker's Guide To Cooking: 2 pkg. cream cheese (the mushy white stuff in silver wrappings that doesn't really come from Philadelphia after all; anyway, about 16 oz.) 1 tsp. vanilla extract (which is more alcohol than vanilla and pretty strong so this part you *GOTTA* measure) 1/4 cup sugar (but honey works fine too) 8 oz. Cool Whip (the fluffy stuff devoid of nutritional value that you can squirt all over your friends and lick off...) "Blend all together until creamy with no lumps." This is where you get to join(1) all the raw data in a big buffer and then filter it through merge(1m) with the -thick option, I mean, it starts out ultra lumpy and icky looking and you have to work hard to mix it. Try an electric beater if you have a cat(1) that can climb wall(1s) to lick it off the ceiling(3m). "Pour into a graham cracker crust..." Aha, the BUGS section at last. You just happened to have a GCC sitting around under /etc/food, right? If not, don't panic(8), merely crumble a rand(3m) handful of innocent GCs into a suitable tempfile and mix in some melted butter. "...and refrigerate for an hour." Leave the recipe's stdout in a fridge for 3.6E6 milliseconds while you work on cleaning up stderr, and by time out your cheesecake will be ready for stdin. There are a lot of lies going around.... and half of them are true. -- Winston Churchill Be open to other people -- they may enrich your dream. People who make no mistakes do not usually make anything. In an orderly world, there's always a place for the disorderly. dunham: You know how real numbers are constructed from rational numbers by equivalence classes of convergent sequences? marcus: yes. All of the animals except man know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it. hangover, n.: The wrath of grapes. I just got out of the hospital after a speed reading accident. I hit a bookmark. -- Steven Wright 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? A committee is a group that keeps the minutes and loses hours. -- Milton Berle FORTUNE EXPLAINS WHAT JOB REVIEW CATCH PHRASES MEAN: #4 consistent: Reviewee hasn't gotten anything right yet, and it is anticipated that this pattern will continue throughout the coming year. an excellent sounding board: Present reviewee with any number of alternatives, and implement them in the order precisely opposite of his/her specification. a planner and organizer: Usually manages to put on socks before shoes. Can match the animal tags on his clothing. Friends were surprised, indeed, when Frank and Jennifer broke their engagement, but Frank had a ready explanation: "Would you marry someone who was habitually unfaithful, who lied at every turn, who was selfish and lazy and sarcastic?" "Of course not," said a sympathetic friend. "Well," retorted Frank, "neither would Jennifer." You can't expect a boy to be vicious till he's been to a good school. -- H. H. Munro I'll show you MY telex number if you show me YOURS ... A Los Angeles judge ruled that "a citizen may snore with immunity in his own home, even though he may be in possession of unusual and exceptional ability in that particular field." In Minnesota they ask why all football fields in Iowa have artificial turf. It's so the cheerleaders won't graze during the game. Well, you can implement a Perl peek() with unpack('P',...). Once you have that, there's only security through obscurity. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199710161537.IAA07828@wall.org> Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo. -- Andy Finkel, computer guy "What time is it?" "I don't know, it keeps changing." It is the wise bird who builds his nest in a tree. A pipe gives a wise man time to think and a fool something to stick in his mouth. Holy Dilemma! Is this the end for the Caped Crusader and the Boy Wonder? Will the Joker and the Riddler have the last laugh? Tune in again tomorrow: same Bat-time, same Bat-channel! "...[Linux's] capacity to talk via any medium except smoke signals." (By Dr. Greg Wettstein, Roger Maris Cancer Center) Laura's Law: No child throws up in the bathroom. It is important to note that the primary reason the Roman Empire fail is that they had no concept of zero... thus they could not test the success or failure of their C programs. You can't hurt me!! I have an ASSUMABLE MORTGAGE!! 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. Do you have lysdexia? Mercury, isn't debugging X a little like finding perfectly bugfree code in windows ?? WildCode: Debugging X is like trying to run a straight line through a maze. You just need to bend space-time so that the corners move around you and you won't have any problems. (=:] All the troubles you have will pass away very quickly. Do you guys know we just passed thru a BLACK HOLE in space? "We never make assertions, Miss Taggart," said Hugh Akston. "That is the moral crime peculiar to our enemies. We do not tell -- we *show*. We do not claim -- we *prove*." -- Ayn Rand, _Atlas Shrugged_ Three hours a day will produce as much as a man ought to write. -- Trollope eat Depends: cook | eat-out. But eat-out is non-free so that's out. And cook Recommends: clean-pans. -- Seen on #Debian Ever wondered about the origins of the term "bugs" as applied to computer technology? U.S. Navy Capt. Grace Murray Hopper has firsthand explanation. The 74-year-old captain, who is still on active duty, was a pioneer in computer technology during World War II. At the C.W. Post Center of Long Island University, Hopper told a group of Long Island public school adminis- trators that the first computer "bug" was a real bug--a moth. At Harvard one August night in 1945, Hopper and her associates were working on the "granddaddy" of modern computers, the Mark I. "Things were going badly; there was something wrong in one of the circuits of the long glass-enclosed computer," she said. "Finally, someone located the trouble spot and, using ordinary tweezers, removed the problem, a two-inch moth. From then on, when anything went wrong with a computer, we said it had bugs in it." Hopper said that when the veracity of her story was questioned recently, "I referred them to my 1945 log book, now in the collection of the Naval Surface Weapons Center, and they found the remains of that moth taped to the page in question." [actually, the term "bug" had even earlier usage in regard to problems with radio hardware. Ed.] Before I knew the best part of my life had come, it had gone. It is better to have loved and lost than just to have lost. Ah, but a man's grasp should exceed his reach, Or what's a heaven for ? -- Robert Browning, "Andrea del Sarto" Hand me a pair of leather pants and a CASIO keyboard -- I'm living for today! Klein bottle for rent -- inquire within. People are beginning to notice you. Try dressing before you leave the house. Didja' ever have to make up your mind, Pick up on one and leave the other behind, It's not often easy, and it's not often kind, Didja' ever have to make up your mind? -- Lovin' Spoonful We gotta get out of this place, If it's the last thing we ever do. -- The Animals The great merit of society is to make one appreciate solitude. -- Charles Chincholles, "Reflections on the Art of Life" Children begin by loving their parents. After a time they judge them. Rarely, if ever, do they forgive them. -- Oscar Wilde Yesterday upon the stair I met a man who wasn't there. He wasn't there again today -- I think he's from the CIA. "Home life as we understand it is no more natural to us than a cage is to a cockatoo." -- George Bernard Shaw TeX is potentially the most significant invention in typesetting in this century. It introduces a standard language for computer typography, and in terms of importance could rank near the introduction of the Gutenberg press. -- Gordon Bell My love, he's mad, and my love, he's fleet, And a wild young wood-thing bore him! The ways are fair to his roaming feet, And the skies are sunlit for him. As sharply sweet to my heart he seems As the fragrance of acacia. My own dear love, he is all my dreams -- And I wish he were in Asia. -- Dorothy Parker, part 2 During the American Revolution, a Britisher tried to raid a farm. He stumbled across a rock on the ground and fell, whereupon an agressive Rhode Island Red hopped on top. Seeing this, the farmer commented, "Chicken catch a Tory!" Try the Moo Shu Pork. It is especially good today. Some programming languages manage to absorb change, but withstand progress. -- Epigrams in Programming, ACM SIGPLAN Sept. 1982 In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence ... in time every post tends to be occupied by an employee who is incompetent to carry out its duties ... Work is accomplished by those employees who have not yet reached their level of incompetence. -- Dr. Laurence J. Peter, "The Peter Principle" life, n.: A whim of several billion cells to be you for a while. Q: How many Martians does it take to screw in a light bulb? A: One and a half. Protect from light. From the moment I picked your book up until I put it down I was convulsed with laughter. Some day I intend reading it. -- Groucho Marx, from "The Book of Insults" A person who is more than casually interested in computers should be well schooled in machine language, since it is a fundamental part of a computer. -- Donald Knuth It isn't an optical illusion. It just looks like one. "The student in question is performing minimally for his peer group and is an emerging underachiever." You have mail. Q: Why is Poland just like the United States? A: In the United States you can't buy anything for zlotys and in Poland you can't either, while in the U.S. you can get whatever you want for dollars, just as you can in Poland. -- being told in Poland, 1987 Girls who throw themselves at men, are actually taking very careful aim. Driver does not carry cash. Nasrudin returned to his village from the imperial capital, and the villagers gathered around to hear what had passed. "At this time," said Nasrudin, "I only want to say that the King spoke to me." All the villagers but the stupidest ran off to spread the wonderful news. The remaining villager asked, "What did the King say to you?" "What he said -- and quite distinctly, for everyone to hear -- was 'Get out of my way!'" The simpleton was overjoyed; he had heard words actually spoken by the King, and seen the very man they were spoken to. Fortune's Contribution of the Month to the Animal Rights Debate: I'll stay out of animals' way if they'll stay out of mine. "Hey you, get off my plate" -- Roger Midnight The right half of the brain controls the left half of the body. This means that only left handed people are in their right mind. The English have no respect for their language, and will not teach their children to speak it. -- G. B. Shaw "Nuclear war would mean abolition of most comforts, and disruption of normal routines, for children and adults alike." -- Willard F. Libby, "You *Can* Survive Atomic Attack" Subtlety is the art of saying what you think and getting out of the way before it is understood. Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, and a dark side, and it holds the universe together ... -- Carl Zwanzig ... of course, this probably only happens for tcsh which uses wait4(), which is why I never saw it. Serves people who use that abomination right 8^) -- Linus Torvalds, about a patch that fixes getrusage for 1.3.26 Sic transit gloria mundi. [So passes away the glory of this world.] -- Thomas `a Kempis Consultant, n.: [From con "to defraud, dupe, swindle," or, possibly, French con (vulgar) "a person of little merit" + sult elliptical form of "insult."] A tipster disguised as an oracle, especially one who has learned to decamp at high speed in spite of a large briefcase and heavy wallet. 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 Not valid with other offers or specials. College: The fountains of knowledge, where everyone goes to drink. Behold, the fool saith, "Put not all thine eggs in the one basket"--which is but a manner of saying, "Scatter your money and your attention;" but the wise man saith, "Put all your eggs in the one basket and--WATCH THAT BASKET." -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" The wombat lives across the seas, Among the far Antipodes. He may exist on nuts and berries, Or then again, on missionaries; His distant habitat precludes Conclusive knowledge of his moods. But I would not engage the wombat In any form of mortal combat. -- "The Wombat" Now is the time for drinking; now the time to beat the earth with unfettered foot. -- Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Horace) Women aren't as mere as they used to be. -- Pogo The only really decent thing to do behind a person's back is pat it. LILO, you've got me on my knees! -- David Black, dblack@pilot.njin.net, with apologies to Derek and the Dominos, and Werner Almsberger Any false value is gonna be fairly boring in Perl, mathematicians notwithstanding. -- Larry Wall in <199707300650.XAA05515@wall.org> All your people must learn before you can reach for the stars. -- Kirk, "The Gamesters of Triskelion", stardate 3259.2 If the aborigine drafted an IQ test, all of Western civilization would presumably flunk it. -- Stanley Garn Fortune's Rules for Memo Wars: #2 Given the incredible advances in sociocybernetics and telepsychology over the last few years, we are now able to completely understand everything that the author of an memo is trying to say. Thanks to modern developments in electrocommunications like notes, vnews, and electricity, we have an incredible level of interunderstanding the likes of which civilization has never known. Thus, the possibility of your misinterpreting someone else's memo is practically nil. Knowing this, anyone who accuses you of having done so is a liar, and should be treated accordingly. If you *do* understand the memo in question, but have absolutely nothing of substance to say, then you have an excellent opportunity for a vicious ad hominem attack. In fact, the only *inappropriate* times for an ad hominem attack are as follows: 1: When you agree completely with the author of an memo. 2: When the author of the original memo is much bigger than you are. 3: When replying to one of your own memos. QOTD: "When she hauled ass, it took three trips." Occupational Slumming: Taking a job well beneath one's skill or education level as a means of retreat from adult responsibilities and/or avoiding failure in one's true occupation. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Dear Ms. Postnews: I couldn't get mail through to somebody on another site. What should I do? -- Eager Beaver Dear Eager: No problem, just post your message to a group that a lot of people read. Say, "This is for John Smith. I couldn't get mail through so I'm posting it. All others please ignore." This way tens of thousands of people will spend a few seconds scanning over and ignoring your article, using up over 16 man-hours their collective time, but you will be saved the terrible trouble of checking through usenet maps or looking for alternate routes. Just think, if you couldn't distribute your message to 9000 other computers, you might actually have to (gasp) call directory assistance for 60 cents, or even phone the person. This can cost as much as a few DOLLARS (!) for a 5 minute call! And certainly it's better to spend 10 to 20 dollars of other people's money distributing the message than for you to have to waste $9 on an overnight letter, or even 25 cents on a stamp! Don't forget. The world will end if your message doesn't get through, so post it as many places as you can. -- Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette Give your child mental blocks for Christmas. With your bare hands?!? I suggest you locate your hot tub outside your house, so it won't do too much damage if it catches fire or explodes. First you decide which direction your hot tub should face for maximum solar energy. After much trial and error, I have found that the best direction for a hot tub to face is up. -- Dave Barry, "The Taming of the Screw" "These are DARK TIMES for all mankind's HIGHEST VALUES!" "These are DARK TIMES for FREEDOM and PROSPERITY!" "These are GREAT TIMES to put your money on BAD GUY to kick the CRAP out of MEGATON MAN!" Just once, I wish we would encounter an alien menace that wasn't immune to bullets. -- The Brigadier, "Dr. Who" Thus spake the master programmer: "Let the programmers be many and the managers few -- then all will be productive." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" HEY KIDS! ANN LANDERS SAYS: Be sure it's true, when you say "I love you". It's a sin to tell a lie. Millions of hearts have been broken, just because these words were spoken. This is the theory that Jack built. This is the flaw that lay in the theory that Jack built. This is the palpable verbal haze that hid the flaw that lay in... When my freshman roommate at Cornell found out I was Jewish, she was, at her request, moved to a different room. She told me she didn't think she had ever seen a Jew before. My only response was to begin wearing a small Star of David on a chain around my neck. I had not become a more observing Jew; rather, discovering that the label of Jew was offensive to others made me want to let people know who I was and what I believed in. Similarly, after talking to these young women -- one of whom told me that she didn't think she had ever met a feminist -- I've taken to identifying myself as a feminist in the most unlikely of situations. -- Susan Bolotin, "Voices From the Post-Feminist Generation" If I had a formula for bypassing trouble, I would not pass it around. Trouble creates a capacity to handle it. I don't say embrace trouble; that's as bad as treating it as an enemy. But I do say meet it as a friend, for you'll see a lot of it and you had better be on speaking terms with it. -- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. Chamberlain's Laws: (1) The big guys always win. (2) Everything tastes more or less like chicken. Would it help if I got out and pushed? -- Princess Leia Organa I am a bookaholic. If you are a decent person, you will not sell me another book. It's currently a problem of access to gigabits through punybaud. -- J. C. R. Licklider The seven eyes of Ningauble the Wizard floated back to his hood as he reported to Fafhrd: "I have seen much, yet cannot explain all. The Gray Mouser is exactly twenty-five feet below the deepest cellar in the palace of Gilpkerio Kistomerces. Even though twenty-four parts in twenty-five of him are dead, he is alive. "Now about Lankhmar. She's been invaded, her walls breached everywhere and desperate fighting is going on in the streets, by a fierce host which out-numbers Lankhamar's inhabitants by fifty to one -- and equipped with all modern weapons. Yet you can save the city." "How?" demanded Fafhrd. Ningauble shrugged. "You're a hero. You should know." -- Fritz Leiber, "The Swords of Lankhmar" There's nothing very mysterious about you, except that nobody really knows your origin, purpose, or destination. Oh don't the days seem lank and long When all goes right and none goes wrong, And isn't your life extremely flat With nothing whatever to grumble at! ----==-- _ / / \ ---==---(_)__ __ ____ __ / / /\ \ --==---/ / _ \/ // /\ \/ / / /_/\ \ \ -=====/_/_//_/\_,_/ /_/\_\ /______\ \ \ A proud member of TeamLinux \_________\/ -- CHaley (HAC), haley@unm.edu, ch008cth@pi.lanl.gov) "Help save the world!" -- Larry Wall in README Everyone who comes in here wants three things: (1) They want it quick. (2) They want it good. (3) They want it cheap. I tell 'em to pick two and call me back. -- sign on the back wall of a small printing company Mason's First Law of Synergism: The one day you'd sell your soul for something, souls are a glut. "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 There are three possible parts to a date, of which at least two must be offered: entertainment, food, and affection. It is customary to begin a series of dates with a great deal of entertainment, a moderate amount of food, and the merest suggestion of affection. As the amount of affection increases, the entertainment can be reduced proportionately. When the affection IS the entertainment, we no longer call it dating. Under no circumstances can the food be omitted. -- Miss Manners' Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behaviour When people say nothing, they don't necessarily mean nothing. MOUNT TAPE U1439 ON B3, NO RING the majority of windoze artists do not have the ability to save xpm LordHavoc: They don't have notepad? *G,D&R* Words must be weighed, not counted. What will you do if all your problems aren't solved by the time you die? We should have a great many fewer disputes in the world if only words were taken for what they are, the signs of our ideas only, and not for things themselves. -- John Locke "The vast majority of successful major crimes against property are perpetrated by individuals abusing positions of trust." -- Lawrence Dalzell If Machiavelli were a hacker, he'd have worked for the CSSG. -- Phil Lapsley A good scapegoat is hard to find. A guilty conscience is the mother of invention. -- Carolyn Wells They're only trying to make me LOOK paranoid! Rhode's Law: When any principle, law, tenet, probability, happening, circumstance, or result can in no way be directly, indirectly, empirically, or circuitously proven, derived, implied, inferred, induced, deducted, estimated, or scientifically guessed, it will always for the purpose of convenience, expediency, political advantage, material gain, or personal comfort, or any combination of the above, or none of the above, be unilaterally and unequivocally assumed, proclaimed, and adhered to as absolute truth to be undeniably, universally, immutably, and infinitely so, until such time as it becomes advantageous to assume otherwise, maybe. Rudin's Law: If there is a wrong way to do something, most people will do it every time. Rudin's Second Law: In a crisis that forces a choice to be made among alternative courses of action, people tend to choose the worst possible course. >Ever heard of .cshrc? That's a city in Bosnia. Right? -- Discussion in comp.os.linux.misc on the intuitiveness of commands Kira: JOIN THE DARK SIDE, YOUNG ONE. darth, I *am* the dark side. And... What in the world ever became of Sweet Jane? She's lost her sparkle, you see she isn't the same. Livin' on reds, vitamin C, and cocaine All a friend can say is "Ain't it a shame?" -- The Grateful Dead Not only is UNIX dead, it's starting to smell really bad. -- Rob Pike In a minimum-phase system there is an inextricable link between frequency response, phase response and transient response, as they are all merely transforms of one another. This combined with minimalization of open-loop errors in output amplifiers and correct compensation for non-linear passive crossover network loading can lead to a significant decrease in system resolution lost. However, this all means jack when you listen to Pink Floyd. but one sort per tab and none per list is arguably better than O(n + n**2) per tab and O(n**2) per list. OMG, someone shoot me. ? I can't believe I just used the big goose-egg to explain why my way is probably best in the long run. I'm proud of my humility. When you die, you lose a very important part of your life. -- Brooke Shields Their idea of an offer you can't refuse is an offer... and you'd better not refuse. DOS: n., A small annoying boot virus that causes random spontaneous system crashes, usually just before saving a massive project. Easily cured by UNIX. See also MS-DOS, IBM-DOS, DR-DOS. (from David Vicker's .plan) The Osmonds! You are all Osmonds!! Throwing up on a freeway at dawn!!! The star of riches is shining upon you. Many years ago in a period commonly know as Next Friday Afternoon, there lived a King who was very Gloomy on Tuesday mornings because he was so Sad thinking about how Unhappy he had been on Monday and how completely Mournful he would be on Wednesday.... -- Walt Kelly Many people feel that if you won't let them make you happy, they'll make you suffer. No self-made man ever did such a good job that some woman didn't want to make some alterations. -- Kim Hubbard 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" The perfect friend sees the best in you -- sees it constantly -- not just when you occasionally are that way, but also when you waver, when you forget yourself, act like less than you are. In time, you become more like his vision of you -- which is the person you have always wanted to be. -- Nancy Friday Linux! Guerrilla UNIX Development Venimus, Vidimus, Dolavimus. -- Mark A. Horton KA4YBR, mah@ka4ybr.com "None of our men are "experts." We have most unfortunately found it necessary to get rid of a man as soon as he thinks himself an expert -- because no one ever considers himself expert if he really knows his job. A man who knows a job sees so much more to be done than he has done, that he is always pressing forward and never gives up an instant of thought to how good and how efficient he is. Thinking always ahead, thinking always of trying to do more, brings a state of mind in which nothing is impossible. The moment one gets into the "expert" state of mind a great number of things become impossible." -- From Henry Ford Sr., "My Life and Work," p. 86 (1922): Subtlety The ancients did not seek to rule people with knowledge, But to help them become natural. It is difficult for knowledgeable people to become natural. To use law to control a nation weakens the nation. But to use nature to control a nation strengthens the nation. Understanding these two paths is understanding subtlety; Subtlety runs deep, ranges wide, Resolves confusion and preserves peace. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" To use violence is to already be defeated. -- Chinese proverb Lubarsky's Law of Cybernetic Entomology: There's always one more bug. [Wisdom] is a tree of life to those laying hold of her, making happy each one holding her fast. -- Proverbs 3:18, NSV Wedding, n: A ceremony at which two persons undertake to become one, one undertakes to become nothing and nothing undertakes to become supportable. -- Ambrose Bierce I'm GLAD I remembered to XEROX all my UNDERSHIRTS!! Americans are people who insist on living in the present, tense. Being overloaded is the sign of a true Debian maintainer. Experience teaches you that the man who looks you straight in the eye, particularly if he adds a firm handshake, is hiding something. -- Clifton Fadiman, "Enter Conversing" Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence. In the space of one hundred and seventy-six years the Mississippi has shortened itself two hundred and forty-two miles. Therefore ... in the Old Silurian Period the Mississippi River was upward of one million three hundred thousand miles long ... seven hundred and forty-two years from now the Mississippi will be only a mile and three-quarters long. ... There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesome returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact. -- Mark Twain The greatest of faults is to be conscious of none. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. -- Francis Bellamy, 1892 The more things change, the more they'll never be the same again. travel, n.: Something that makes you feel like you're getting somewhere. His mind is like a steel trap: full of mice. -- Foghorn Leghorn You should avoid hedging, at least that's what I think. 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 "Don't think; let the machine do it for you!" -- E. C. Berkeley This login session: $13.76, but for you $11.88. We have phasers, I vote we blast 'em! -- Bailey, "The Corbomite Maneuver", stardate 1514.2 Bagdikian's Observation: Trying to be a first-rate reporter on the average American newspaper is like trying to play Bach's "St. Matthew Passion" on a ukelele. An authority is a person who can tell you more about something than you really care to know. You can bear anything if it isn't your own fault. -- Katharine Fullerton Gerould Human kind cannot bear very much reality. -- T. S. Eliot, "Four Quartets: Burnt Norton" I took a fish head to the movies and I didn't have to pay. -- Fish Heads, Saturday Night Live, 1977. Familiarity breeds attempt. Who is John Galt? Other restrictions may apply. "Marriage is low down, but you spend the rest of your life paying for it." -- Baskins A failure will not appear until a unit has passed final inspection. Life's too short to dance with ugly women. You are always doing something marginal when the boss drops by your desk. The Guy on the Right Doesn't Stand a Chance The guy on the right has the Osborne 1, a fully functional computer system in a portable package the size of a briefcase. The guy on the left has an Uzi submachine gun concealed in his attache case. Also in the case are four fully loaded, 32-round clips of 125-grain 9mm ammunition. The owner of the Uzi is going to get more tactical firepower delivered -- and delivered on target -- in less time, and with less effort. All for $795. It's inevitable. If you're going up against some guy with an Osborne 1 -- or any personal computer -- he's the one who's in trouble. One round from an Uzi can zip through ten inches of solid pine wood, so you can imagine what it will do to structural foam acrylic and sheet aluminum. In fact, detachable magazines for the Uzi are available in 25-, 32-, and 40-round capacities, so you can take out an entire office full of Apple II or IBM Personal Computers tied into Ethernet or other local-area networks. What about the new 16-bit computers, like the Lisa and Fortune? Even with the Winchester backup, they're no match for the Uzi. One quick burst and they'll find out what Unix means. Make your commanding officer proud. Get an Uzi -- and come home a winner in the fight for office automatic weapons. -- "InfoWorld", June, 1984 "Benson, you are so free of the ravages of intelligence" -- Time Bandits Someone in DAYTON, Ohio is selling USED CARPETS to a SERBO-CROATIAN There is no such thing as inner peace. There is only nervousness or death. Any attempt to prove otherwise constitutes unacceptable behaviour. -- Fran Lebowitz, "Metropolitan Life" I'm having an EMOTIONAL OUTBURST!! But, uh, WHY is there a WAFFLE in my PAJAMA POCKET?? Enjoy yourself while you're still old. Confession is good for the soul, but bad for the career. You must know that a man can have only one invulnerable loyalty, loyalty to his own concept of the obligations of manhood. All other loyalties are merely deputies of that one. -- Nero Wolfe If the future navigation system [for interactive networked services on the NII] looks like something from Microsoft, it will never work. -- Chairman of Walt Disney Television & Telecommunications Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, If I should die before I wake, I'll cry in anguish, "Mistake!! Mistake!!" As long as there are entrenched social and political distinctions between sexes, races or classes, there will be forms of science whose main function is to rationalize and legitimize these distinctions. -- Elizabeth Fee I really hate this damned machine I wish that they would sell it. It never does quite what I want But only what I tell it. All names listed are proprietary trademarks of their respective corporations. Work Hard. Rock Hard. Eat Hard. Sleep Hard. Grow Big. Wear Glasses If You Need 'Em. -- The Webb Wilder Credo God, I ask for patience -- and I want it right now! #if _FP_W_TYPE_SIZE < 64 #error "Only stud muffins allowed, schmuck." #endif -- linux/arch/sparc64/quad.c We can embody the truth, but we cannot know it. -- Yates Anyone can become angry -- that is easy; but to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose and in the right way -- that is not easy. -- Aristotle Minimum charge for booths. Your files are now being encrypted and thrown into the bit bucket. EOF Employees must wash hands before returning to work. For knighthood is not in the feats of war, As for to fight in quarrel right or wrong, But in a cause which truth cannot defer: He ought himself for to make sure and strong, Just to keep mixt with mercy among: And no quarrel a knight ought to take But for a truth, or for the common's sake. -- Stephen Hawes In Greene, New York, it is illegal to eat peanuts and walk backwards on the sidewalks when a concert is on. You will lose an important disk file. The key elements in human thinking are not numbers but labels of fuzzy sets. -- L. Zadeh There be sober men a'plenty, and drunkards barely twenty; there are men of over ninety who have never yet kissed a girl. But give me the rambling rover, from Orkney down to Dover, we will roam the whole world over, and together we'll face the world. -- Andy Stewart, "After the Hush" A musician of more ambition than talent composed an elegy at the death of composer Edward MacDowell. She played the elegy for the pianist Josef Hoffman, then asked his opinion. "Well, it's quite nice," he replied, but don't you think it would be better if..." "If what?" asked the composer. "If ... if you had died and MacDowell had written the elegy?" Nothing cures insomnia like the realization that it's time to get up. Go away, I'm all right. -- H. G. Wells' last words. A help wanted add for a photo journalist asked the rhetorical question: If you found yourself in a situation where you could either save a drowning man, or you could take a Pulitzer prize winning photograph of him drowning, what shutter speed and setting would you use? -- Paul Harvey Virtue is not left to stand alone. He who practices it will have neighbors. -- Confucius HOORAY, Ronald!! Now YOU can marry LINDA RONSTADT too!! Age and treachery will always overcome youth and skill. Tell a man there are 300 billion stars in the universe and he'll believe you. Tell him a bench has wet paint on it and he'll have to touch to be sure. The man with the best job in the country is the Vice President. All he has to do is get up every morning and say, "How's the President?" -- Will Rogers The vice-presidency ain't worth a pitcher of warm spit. -- Vice President John Nance Garner CHUBBY CHECKER just had a CHICKEN SANDWICH in downtown DULUTH! Remember that there is an outside world to see and enjoy. -- Hans Liepmann Democracy is a form of government in which it is permitted to wonder aloud what the country could do under first-class management. -- Senator Soaper court, n.: A place where they dispense with justice. -- Arthur Train Cruickshank's Law of Committees: If a committee is allowed to discuss a bad idea long enough, it will inevitably decide to implement the idea simply because so much work has already been done on it. QOTD: I'm not bald -- I'm "hair challenged". [I thought that was "differently haired". Ed.] 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. One of the signs of Napoleon's greatness is the fact that he once had a publisher shot. -- Siegfried Unseld Men say of women what pleases them; women do with men what pleases them. -- DeSegur Today is a good day to bribe a high-ranking public official. Running Windows on a Pentium is like having a brand new Porsche but only be able to drive backwards with the handbrake on. (Unknown source) I always have fun because I'm out of my mind!!! It is better to never have tried anything than to have tried something and failed. -- motto of jerks, weenies and losers everywhere Just close your eyes, tap your heels together three times, and think to yourself, `There's no place like home.' -- Glynda the Good "Danger, you haven't seen the last of me!" "No, but the first of you turns my stomach!" -- The Firesign Theatre's Nick Danger TAILFINS!! ... click ... Minicomputer: A computer that can be afforded on the budget of a middle-level manager. I think there's a world market for about five computers. -- attr. Thomas J. Watson (Chairman of the Board, IBM), 1943 I'm gliding over a NUCLEAR WASTE DUMP near ATLANTA, Georgia!! It is so soon that I am done for, I wonder what I was begun for. -- Epitaph, Cheltenham Churchyard You can now buy more gates with less specifications than at any other time in history. -- Kenneth Parker People seem to enjoy things more when they know a lot of other people have been left out on the pleasure. -- Russell Baker We are MicroSoft. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. -- Attributed to B.G., Gill Bates Like I always say -- nothing can beat the BRATWURST here in DUSSELDORF!! Romulan women are not like Vulcan females. We are not dedicated to pure logic and the sterility of non-emotion. -- Romulan Commander, "The Enterprise Incident", stardate 5027.3 "Once he had one leg in the White House and the nation trembled under his roars. Now he is a tinpot pope in the Coca-Cola belt and a brother to the forlorn pastors who belabor halfwits in galvanized iron tabernacles behind the railroad yards." - H. L. Mencken, writing of William Jennings Bryan, counsel for the supporters of Tennessee's anti-evolution law at the Scopes "Monkey Trial" in 1925. But I was there and I saw what you did, I saw it with my own two eyes. So you can wipe off that grin; I know where you've been-- It's all been a pack of lies! "The hottest places in Hell are reserved for those who, in times of moral crisis, preserved their neutrality." -- Dante Man who falls in vat of molten optical glass makes spectacle of self. "I changed my headlights the other day. I put in strobe lights instead! Now when I drive at night, it looks like everyone else is standing still ..." -- Steven Wright Collaboration, n.: A literary partnership based on the false assumption that the other fellow can spell. Sin The Way is the fate of men, The treasure of the saint, And the refuge of the sinner. Fine words are often borrowed, And great deeds are often appropriated; Therefore, when a man falls, do not abandon him, And when a man gains power, do not honour him; Only remain impartial and show him the Way. Why should someone appreciate the Way? The ancients said, "By it, those who seek may easily find, And those who regret may easily absolve" So it is the most precious gift. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" There has also been some work to allow the interesting use of macro names. For example, if you wanted all of your "creat()" calls to include read permissions for everyone, you could say #define creat(file, mode) creat(file, mode | 0444) I would recommend against this kind of thing in general, since it hides the changed semantics of "creat()" in a macro, potentially far away from its uses. To allow this use of macros, the preprocessor uses a process that is worth describing, if for no other reason than that we get to use one of the more amusing terms introduced into the C lexicon. While a macro is being expanded, it is temporarily undefined, and any recurrence of the macro name is "painted blue" -- I kid you not, this is the official terminology -- so that in future scans of the text the macro will not be expanded recursively. (I do not know why the color blue was chosen; I'm sure it was the result of a long debate, spread over several meetings.) -- From Ken Arnold's "C Advisor" column in Unix Review Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted. When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. -- Sherlock Holmes, "The Sign of Four" Linux, the way to get rid of boot viruses -- MaDsen Wikholm, mwikholm@at8.abo.fi The most advantageous, pre-eminent thing thou canst do is not to exhibit nor display thyself within the limits of our galaxy, but rather depart instantaneously whence thou even now standest and flee to yet another rotten planet in the universe, if thou canst have the good fortune to find one. -- Carlyle Frankfort, Kentucky, makes it against the law to shoot off a policeman's tie. There's a lesson that I need to remember When everything is falling apart In life, just like in loving There's such a thing as trying to hard You've gotta sing Like you don't need the money Love like you'll never get hurt You've gotta dance Like nobody's watching It's gotta come from the heart If you want it to work. -- Kathy Mattea 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. And the crowd was stilled. One elderly man, wondering at the sudden silence, turned to the Child and asked him to repeat what he had said. Wide-eyed, the Child raised his voice and said once again, "Why, the Emperor has no clothes! He is naked!" -- "The Emperor's New Clothes" Better late than never. -- Titus Livius (Livy) I just had my entire INTESTINAL TRACT coated with TEFLON! Tact is the art of making a point without making an enemy. When you're ready to give up the struggle, who can you surrender to? QOTD: "I used to be lost in the shuffle, now I just shuffle along with the lost." Painting, n.: The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather, and exposing them to the critic. -- Ambrose Bierce If puns were deli meat, this would be the wurst. QOTD: "She's about as smart as bait." If he once again pushes up his sleeves in order to compute for 3 days and 3 nights in a row, he will spend a quarter of an hour before to think which principles of computation shall be most appropriate. -- Voltaire, "Diatribe du docteur Akakia" Your canceled check is your receipt. Art is either plagiarism or revolution. -- Paul Gauguin This font is starting to come out very nicely Knghtbrd: oh dear, are you hacking up another quake font in vi? :) > Linux is not user-friendly. It _is_ user-friendly. It is not ignorant-friendly and idiot-friendly. -- Seen somewhere on the net A robin redbreast in a cage Puts all Heaven in a rage. -- Blake Waking a person unnecessarily should not be considered a capital crime. For a first offense, that is. A quarrel is quickly settled when deserted by one party; there is no battle unless there be two. -- Seneca netgod: what do you have in your kernel??? The compiled source for driving a space shuttle??? time to make a zip drive your floppy drive then. if the kernel doesn fit on that, the kernel is an AI Norm: Hey, everybody. All: [silence; everybody is mad at Norm for being rich.] Norm: [Carries on both sides of the conversation himself.] Norm! (Norman.) How are you feeling today, Norm? Rich and thirsty. Pour me a beer. -- Cheers, Tan 'n Wash Woody: What's the latest, Mr. Peterson? Norm: Zsa-Zsa marries a millionaire, Peterson drinks a beer. Film at eleven. -- Cheers, Knights of the Scimitar Woody: How are you today, Mr. Peterson? Norm: Never been better, Woody. ... Just once I'd like to be better. -- Cheers, Chambers vs. Malone Success is a journey, not a destination. I couldn't possibly fail to disagree with you less. The soul would have no rainbow had the eyes no tears. Well, my daddy left home when I was three, And he didn't leave much for Ma and me, Just and old guitar an'a empty bottle of booze. Now I don't blame him 'cause he ran and hid, But the meanest thing that he ever did, Was before he left he went and named me Sue. ... But I made me a vow to the moon and the stars, I'd search the honkey tonks and the bars, And kill the man that give me that awful name. It was Gatlinburg in mid-July, I'd just hit town and my throat was dry, Thought I'd stop and have myself a brew, At an old saloon on a street of mud, Sitting at a table, dealing stud, Sat that dirty (bleep) that named me Sue. ... Now, I knew that snake was my own sweet Dad, From a wornout picture that my Mother had, And I knew that scar on his cheek and his evil eye... -- Johnny Cash, "A Boy Named Sue" Flon's Law: There is not now, and never will be, a language in which it is the least bit difficult to write bad programs. Happiness is the greatest good. Children are unpredictable. You never know what inconsistency they're going to catch you in next. -- Franklin P. Jones The FIELD GUIDE to NORTH AMERICAN MALES SPECIES: Cranial Males SUBSPECIES: The Hacker (homo computatis) Courtship & Mating: Due to extreme deprivation, HOMO COMPUTATIS maintains a near perpetual state of sexual readiness. Courtship behavior alternates between awkward shyness and abrupt advances. When he finally mates, he chooses a female engineer with an unblinking stare, a tight mouth, and a complete collection of Campbell's soup-can recipes. Track: Trash cans full of pale green and white perforated paper and old copies of the Allen-Bradley catalog. Comments: Extremely fond of bad puns and jokes that need long explanations. Money can't buy happiness, but it can make you awfully comfortable while you're being miserable. -- C. B. Luce A Code of Honour: never approach a friend's girlfriend or wife with mischief as your goal. There are too many women in the world to justify that sort of dishonourable behaviour. Unless she's really attractive. -- Bruce J. Friedman, "Sex and the Lonely Guy" A statistician, who refused to fly after reading of the alarmingly high probability that there will be a bomb on any given plane, realized that the probability of there being two bombs on any given flight is very low. Now, whenever he flies, he carries a bomb with him. The trouble with this country is that there are too many politicians who believe, with a conviction based on experience, that you can fool all of the people all of the time. -- Franklin Adams The best case: Get salary from America, build a house in England, live with a Japanese wife, and eat Chinese food. Pretty good case: Get salary from England, build a house in America, live with a Chinese wife, and eat Japanese food. The worst case: Get salary from China, build a house in Japan, live with a British wife, and eat American food. -- Bungei Shunju, a popular Japanese magazine Got a complaint about the Internal Revenue Service? Call the convenient toll-free "IRS Taxpayer Complaint Hot Line Number": 1-800-AUDITME Q: What does it say on the bottom of Coke cans in North Dakota? A: Open other end. If Machiavelli were a hacker, he'd have worked for the CSSG. -- Phil Lapsley Non-Reciprocal Laws of Expectations: Negative expectations yield negative results. Positive expectations yield negative results. Q: How many mathematicians does it take to screw in a light bulb? A: One. He gives it to six Californians, thereby reducing the problem to the earlier joke. Man who sleep in beer keg wake up sticky. We are what we are. What you want, what you're hanging around in the world waiting for, is for something to occur to you. -- Robert Frost [Quoted in "VMS Internals and Data Structures", V4.4, when referring to AST's.] Lack of skill dictates economy of style. -- Joey Ramone Understanding is always the understanding of a smaller problem in relation to a bigger problem. -- P. D. Ouspensky For God's sake, stop researching for a while and begin to think! Please take note: What PROGRAM are they watching? If you just try long enough and hard enough, you can always manage to boot yourself in the posterior. -- A. J. Liebling, "The Press" "What you end up with, after running an operating system concept through these many marketing coffee filters, is something not unlike plain hot water." (By Matt Welsh) I understand why you're confused. You're thinking too much. -- Carole Wallach. They are ill discoverers that think there is no land, when they can see nothing but sea. -- Francis Bacon When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life. -- Samuel Johnson LOGO for the Dead LOGO for the Dead lets you continue your computing activities from "The Other Side." The package includes a unique telecommunications feature which lets you turn your TRS-80 into an electronic Ouija board. Then, using Logo's graphics capabilities, you can work with a friend or relative on this side of the Great Beyond to write programs. The software requires that your body be hardwired to an analog-to-digital converter, which is then interfaced to your computer. A special terminal (very terminal) program lets you talk with the users through Deadnet, an EBBS (Ectoplasmic Bulletin Board System). LOGO for the Dead is available for 10 percent of your estate from NecroSoft inc., 6502 Charnelhouse Blvd., Cleveland, OH 44101. -- '80 Microcomputing The true way goes over a rope which is not stretched at any great height but just above the ground. It seems more designed to make people stumble than to be walked upon. -- Franz Kafka When taxes are due, Americans tend to feel quite bled-white and blue. You've always made the mistake of being yourself. -- Eugene Ionesco It is better to be bow-legged than no-legged. "An honest god is the noblest work of man. ... God has always resembled his creators. He hated and loved what they hated and loved and he was invariably found on the side of those in power. ... Most of the gods were pleased with sacrifice, and the smell of innocent blood has ever been considered a divine perfume." -- Robert G. Ingersoll How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O prince's daughter! the joints of thy thighs are like jewels, the work of the hands of a cunning workman. Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor: thy belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies. Thy two breasts are like two young roses that are twins. [Song of Solomon 7:1-3 (KJV)] It's the thought, if any, that counts! Truth never comes into the world but like a bastard, to the ignominy of him that brought her birth. -- Milton no! problems in M$ software? "Thoroughly bugtested" * Dabb grins. rewrite that as 'Thoroughly buginfested' The carbonyl is polarized, The delta end is plus. The nucleophile will thus attack, The carbon nucleus. Addition makes an alcohol, Of types there are but three. It makes a bond, to correspond, From C to shining C. -- Prof. Frank Westheimer, to "America the Beautiful" For the fashion of Minas Tirith was such that it was built on seven levels, each delved into a hill, and about each was set a wall, and in each wall was a gate. -- J.R.R. Tolkien, "The Return of the King" [Quoted in "VMS Internals and Data Structures", V4.4, when referring to system overview.] If you stick a stock of liquor in your locker, It is slick to stick a lock upon your stock. Or some joker who is slicker, Will trick you of your liquor, If you fail to lock your liquor with a lock. Innocence ends when one is stripped of the delusion that one likes oneself. -- Joan Didion, "On Self Respect" Everyone wants results, but no one is willing to do what it takes to get them. -- Dirty Harry Great minds run in great circles. You have not converted a man because you have silenced him. -- John Viscount Morley "You tweachewous miscweant!" -- Elmer Fudd 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 Education is the process of casting false pearls before real swine. -- Irwin Edman There's no real need to do housework -- after four years it doesn't get any worse. Let me put it this way: today is going to be a learning experience. Tim and I a hunting went We found three damsels in a tent, As they were three, and we were two, I bucked one and Timbuktu. -- the only known poem using the word "Timbuktu" "Any medium powerful enough to extend man's reach is powerful enough to topple his world. To get the medium's magic to work for one's aims rather than against them is to attain literacy." -- Alan Kay, "Computer Software", Scientific American, September 1984 "For the love of phlegm...a stupid wall of death rays. How tacky can ya get?" -- Post Brothers comics Oh, when I was in love with you, Then I was clean and brave, And miles around the wonder grew How well did I behave. And now the fancy passes by, And nothing will remain, And miles around they'll say that I Am quite myself again. -- A. E. Housman Joshu: What is the true Way? Nansen: Every way is the true Way. J: Can I study it? N: The more you study, the further from the Way. J: If I don't study it, how can I know it? N: The Way does not belong to things seen: nor to things unseen. It does not belong to things known: nor to things unknown. Do not seek it, study it, or name it. To find yourself on it, open yourself as wide as the sky. 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 Desist from enumerating your fowl prior to their emergence from the shell. Azh nazg durbatal^uk, azh nazg gimbatul, Azh nazg thrakatal^uk agh burzum ishi krimpatul! -- J. R. R. Tolkien "It's like deja vu all over again." -- Yogi Berra "Rights" is a fictional abstraction. No one has "Rights", neither machines nor flesh-and-blood. Persons... have opportunities, not rights, which they use or do not use. -- Lazarus Long It's computer hardware, of course it's worth having -- Espy on #Debian * This is complicated. Has to do with interrupts. Thus, I am * scared witless. Therefore I refuse to write this function. :-P -- From the maclinux patch Even historians fail to learn from history -- they repeat the same mistakes. -- John Gill, "Patterns of Force", stardate 2534.7 It is easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them. -- Alfred Adler A child of five could understand this! Fetch me a child of five. 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. I have seen the future and it is just like the present, only longer. -- Kehlog Albran, "The Profit" We don't know one millionth of one percent about anything. A bachelor is a man who never made the same mistake once. If you haven't enjoyed the material in the last few lectures then a career in chartered accountancy beckons. -- Advice from the lecturer in the middle of the Stochastic Systems course. And now your toner's toney, Disk blocks aplenty And your paper near pure white, Await your laser drawn lines, The smudges on your soul are gone Your intricate fonts, And your output's clean as light.. Your pictures and signs. We've labored with your father, Your amputative absence The venerable XGP, Has made the Ten dumb, But his slow artistic hand, Without you, Dover, Lacks your clean velocity. We're system untounged- Theses and papers DRAW Plots and TEXage And code in a queue Have been biding their time, Dover, oh Dover, With LISP code and programs, We've been waiting for you. And this crufty rhyme. Dover, oh Dover, Dover, oh Dover, arisen from dead. We welcome you back, Dover, oh Dover, awoken from bed. Though still you may jam, Dover, oh Dover, welcome back to the Lab. You're on the right track. Dover, oh Dover, we've missed your clean hand... That's the thing about people who think they hate computers. What they really hate is lousy programmers. -- Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle in "Oath of Fealty" Would it be acceptable to debian policy if we inserted a crontab by default into potato that emailed bill.gates@microsoft.com every morning with an email that read, "Don't worry, linux is a fad..." The trouble with heart disease is that the first symptom is often hard to deal with: death. -- Michael Phelps Blackout restrictions apply. A pessimist is a man who has been compelled to live with an optimist. -- Elbert Hubbard Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in. -- Sydney J. Harris Vax Vobiscum A sociologist, a psychologist, and a engineer were discussing the consequences and implications of a married man's having a mistress. The sociologist's opinion was that it is absolutely and categorically unforgivable for a married man to forfeit the bond of matrimony, and engage in such lowly and lustful pursuits. The psychologist's opinion was that although morally reprehensible, if a man MUST have a mistress to achieve his full potential as a human being, then -- well -- he may go ahead and choose to have a mistress, as long as he is considerate enough to keep this secret from his wife. The engineer then interjected: "I also believe that, if necessary, a married man is entitled to a mistress. However, I do not see why the affair should be concealed from the wife. On the contrary, if the affair is out in the open, then on Friday evenings he may tell his wife that he is going to see his mistress, tell his mistress that he is going to be with his wife, then go to his office and get some work done!" You can't have your cake and let your neighbor eat it too. -- Ayn Rand Smoking is the leading cause of statistics. Earn cash in your spare time -- blackmail your friends. If you've done six impossible things before breakfast, why not round it off with dinner at Milliway's, the restaurant at the end of the universe? -- Douglas Adams, "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe" The problem that we thought was a problem was, indeed, a problem, but not the problem we thought was the problem. -- Mike Smith He who attacks the fundamentals of the American broadcasting industry attacks democracy itself. -- William S. Paley, chairman of CBS Plagiarize, plagiarize, Let no man's work evade your eyes, Remember why the good Lord made your eyes, Don't shade your eyes, But plagiarize, plagiarize, plagiarize. Only be sure to call it research. -- Tom Lehrer "Good afternoon, madam. How may I help you?" "Good afternoon. I'd like a FrintArms HandCannon, please." "A--? Oh, now, that's an awfully big gun for such a lovely lady. I mean, not everybody thinks ladies should carry guns at all, though I say they have a right to. But I think... I might... Let's have a look down here. I might have just the thing for you. Yes, here we are! Look at that, isn't it neat? Now that is a FrintArms product as well, but it's what's called a laser -- a light-pistol some people call them. Very small, as you see; fits easily into a pocket or bag; won't spoil the line of a jacket; and you won't feel you're lugging half a tonne of iron around with you. We do a range of matching accessories, including -- if I may say so -- a rather saucy garter holster. Wish I got to do the fitting for that! Ha -- just my little joke. And there's *even*... here we are -- this special presentation pack: gun, charged battery, charging unit, beautiful glider-hide shoulder holster with adjustable fitting and contrast stitching, and a discount on your next battery. Full instructions, of course, and a voucher for free lessons at your local gun club or range. Or there's the *special* presentation pack; it has all the other one's got but with *two* charged batteries and a night-sight, too. Here, feel that -- don't worry, it's a dummy battery -- isn't it neat? Feel how light it is? Smooth, see? No bits to stick out and catch on your clothes, *and* beautifully balanced. And of course the beauty of a laser is, there's no recoil. Because it's shooting light, you see? Beautiful gun, beautiful gun; my wife has one. Really. That's not a line, she really has. Now, I can do you that one -- with a battery and a free charge -- for ninety-five; or the presentation pack on a special offer for one-nineteen; or this, the special presentation pack, for one-forty-nine." "I'll take the special." "Sound choice, madam, *sound* choice. Now, do--?" "And a HandCannon, with the eighty-mill silencer, five GP clips, three six-five AP/wire-fl'echettes clips, two bipropellant HE clips, and a Special Projectile Pack if you have one -- the one with the embedding rounds, not the signalers. I assume the night-sight on this toy is compatible?" "Aah... yes, And how does madam wish to pay?" She slapped her credit card on the counter. "Eventually." -- Iain M. Banks, "Against a Dark Background" A little retrospection shows that although many fine, useful software systems have been designed by committees and built as part of multipart projects, those software systems that have excited passionate fans are those that are the products of one or a few designing minds, great designers. Consider Unix, APL, Pascal, Modula, the Smalltalk interface, even Fortran; and contrast them with Cobol, PL/I, Algol, MVS/370, and MS-DOS. -- Fred Brooks Love is like the measles; we all have to go through it. -- Jerome K. Jerome Marxist Law of Distribution of Wealth: Shortages will be divided equally among the peasants. Her locks an ancient lady gave Her loving husband's life to save; And men -- they honored so the dame -- Upon some stars bestowed her name. But to our modern married fair, Who'd give their lords to save their hair, No stellar recognition's given. There are not stars enough in heaven. A person who is more than casually interested in computers should be well schooled in machine language, since it is a fundamental part of a computer. -- Donald Knuth Some equipment shown is optional. Satire is what closes in New Haven. Little Fly, Thy summer's play If thought is life My thoughtless hand And strength & breath, Has brush'd away. And the want Of thought is death, Am not I A fly like thee? Then am I Or art not thou A happy fly A man like me? If I live Or if I die. For I dance And drink & sing, Till some blind hand Shall brush my wing. -- William Blake, "The Fly" There is no security on this earth. There is only opportunity. -- General Douglas MacArthur Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate. -- John F. Kennedy No man is an island if he's on at least one mailing list. The wombat lives across the seas, Among the far Antipodes. He may exist on nuts and berries, Or then again, on missionaries; His distant habitat precludes Conclusive knowledge of his moods. But I would not engage the wombat In any form of mortal combat. -- "The Wombat" Q: How do you catch a unique rabbit? A: Unique up on it! Q: How do you catch a tame rabbit? A: The tame way! "The urge to destroy is also a creative urge." -- Bakunin [ed. note - I would say: The urge to destroy may sometimes be a creative urge.] "I'd love to go out with you, but I'm having all my plants neutered." We have a policy that we are not being hacked. -- Lisa Kopp, Friendster rep, commenting on a security flaw http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.06/dating_pr.html Your reasoning is excellent -- it's only your basic assumptions that are wrong. Quid me anxius sum? [ What? Me, worry? ] Knucklehead: "Knock, knock" Pee Wee: "Who's there?" Knucklehead: "Little ol' lady." Pee Wee: "Liddle ol' lady who?" Knucklehead: "I didn't know you could yodel" A conclusion is simply the place where someone got tired of thinking. Bank error in your favor. Collect $200. Postage will be paid by addressee. Divorce Assumption: A form of Safety Net-ism, the belief that if a marriage doesn't work out, then there is no problem because partners can simply seek a divorce. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" If God had meant for us to be naked, we would have been born that way. And that's the way it is... -- Walter Cronkite Back when I was a boy, it was 40 miles to everywhere, uphill both ways and it was always snowing. No amount of careful planning will ever replace dumb luck. Stop! Whoever crosseth the bridge of Death, must answer first these questions three, ere the other side he see! "What is your name?" "Sir Brian of Bell." "What is your quest?" "I seek the Holy Grail." "What are four lowercase letters that are not legal flag arguments to the Berkeley UNIX version of `ls'?" "I, er.... AIIIEEEEEE!" For your penance, say five Hail Marys and one loud BLAH! His ideas of first-aid stopped short of squirting soda water. -- P. G. Wodehouse Even if we put all these nagging thoughts [four embarrassing questions about astrology] aside for a moment, one overriding question remains to be asked. Why would the positions of celestial objects at the moment of birth have an effect on our characters, lives, or destinies? What force or influence, what sort of energy would travel from the planets and stars to all human beings and affect our development or fate? No amount of scientific-sounding jargon or computerized calculations by astrologers can disguise this central problem with astrology -- we can find no evidence of a mechanism by which celestial objects can influence us in so specific and personal a way. . . . Some astrologers argue that there may be a still unknown force that represents the astrological influence. . . .If so, astrological predictions -- like those of any scientific field -- should be easily tested. . . . Astrologers always claim to be just a little too busy to carry out such careful tests of their efficacy, so in the last two decades scientists and statisticians have generously done such testing for them. There have been dozens of well-designed tests all around the world, and astrology has failed every one of them. . . . I propose that we let those beckoning lights in the sky awaken our interest in the real (and fascinating) universe beyond our planet, and not let them keep us tied to an ancient fantasy left over from a time when we huddled by the firelight, afraid of the night. -- Andrew Fraknoi, Executive Officer, Astronomical Society of the Pacific, "Why Astrology Believers Should Feel Embarrassed," San Jose Mercury News, May 8, 1988 Delta: We're Amtrak with wings. -- David Letterman You can't evaluate a man by logic alone. -- McCoy, "I, Mudd", stardate 4513.3 Fly me away to the bright side of the moon ... Operating-system software is the program that orchestrates all the basic functions of a computer. -- The Wall Street Journal, Tuesday, September 15, 1987, page 40 Nature is by and large to be found out of doors, a location where, it cannot be argued, there are never enough comfortable chairs. -- Fran Lebowitz I want EARS! I want two ROUND BLACK EARS to make me feel warm 'n secure!! ... Had this been an actual emergency, we would have fled in terror, and you would not have been informed. The happiest time of a person's life is after his first divorce. -- J. K. Galbraith "The pathology is to want control, not that you ever get it, because of course you never do." -- Gregory Bateson Victory or defeat! Nuclear powered vacuuum cleaners will probably be a reality within 10 years. -- Alex Lewyt (President of the Lewyt Corporation, manufacturers of vacuum cleaners), quoted in The New York Times, June 10, 1955. If the rich could pay the poor to die for them, what a living the poor could make! semper en excretus To Perl, or not to Perl, that is the kvetching. -- Larry Wall in <199801200310.TAA11670@wall.org> If you want divine justice, die. -- Nick Seldon Men ought to know that from the brain and from the brain only arise our pleasures, joys, laughter, and jests as well as our sorrows, pains, griefs and tears. ... It is the same thing which makes us mad or delirious, inspires us with dread and fear, whether by night or by day, brings us sleeplessness, inopportune mistakes, aimless anxieties, absent-mindedness and acts that are contrary to habit... -- Hippocrates "The Sacred Disease" George Bernard Shaw once sent two tickets to the opening night of one of his plays to Winston Churchill with the following note: "Bring a friend, if you have one." Churchill wrote back, returning the two tickets and excused himself as he had a previous engagement. He also attached the following: "Please send me two tickets for the next night, if there is one." If you're not careful, you're going to catch something. The hearing ear is always found close to the speaking tongue, a custom whereof the memory of man runneth not howsomever to the contrary, nohow. May the bluebird of happiness twiddle your bits. Bleeding Ponytail: An elderly, sold-out baby boomer who pines for hippie or presellout days. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" He who invents adages for others to peruse takes along rowboat when going on cruise. A mother takes twenty years to make a man of her boy, and another woman makes a fool of him in twenty minutes. -- Frost The average income of the modern teenager is about 2 a.m. What the scientists have in their briefcases is terrifying. -- Nikita Khruschev Any stone in your boot always migrates against the pressure gradient to exactly the point of most pressure. -- Milt Barber Love conquers all things; let us too surrender to love. -- Publius Vergilius Maro (Virgil) When I heated my home with oil, I used an average of 800 gallons a year. I have found that I can keep comfortably warm for an entire winter with slightly over half that quantity of beer. -- Dave Barry, "Postpetroleum Guzzler" "Waving away a cloud of smoke, I look up, and am blinded by a bright, white light. It's God. No, not Richard Stallman, or Linus Torvalds, but God. In a booming voice, He says: "THIS IS A SIGN. USE LINUX, THE FREE UNIX SYSTEM FOR THE 386." (Matt Welsh) Correction does much, but encouragement does more. -- Goethe Avoid cliches like the plague. They're a dime a dozen. Haste makes waste. -- John Heywood Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself. -- Mark Twain My godda bless, never I see sucha people. -- Signor Piozzi, quoted by Cecilia Thrale With/Without - and who'll deny it's what the fighting's all about? -- Pink Floyd I think that all right-thinking people in this country are sick and tired of being told that ordinary decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired. I'm certainly not. But I'm sick and tired of being told that I am. -- Monty Python He's the kind of guy, that, well, if you were ever in a jam he'd be there... with two slices of bread and some chunky peanut butter. Four fifths of the perjury in the world is expended on tombstones, women and competitors. -- Lord Thomas Dewar Now it's time to say goodbye To all our company... M-I-C (see you next week!) K-E-Y (Why? Because we LIKE you!) M-O-U-S-E. Beware of the Turing tar-pit in which everything is possible but nothing of interest is easy. -- Alan Perlis They spell it "da Vinci" and pronounce it "da Vinchy". Foreigners always spell better than they pronounce. -- Mark Twain If we spoke a different language, we would perceive a somewhat different world. -- Wittgenstein In Africa some of the native tribes have a custom of beating the ground with clubs and uttering spine chilling cries. Anthropologists call this a form of primitive self-expression. In America we call it golf. Every creature has within him the wild, uncontrollable urge to punt. -- Snoopy Fresco's Discovery: If you knew what you were doing you'd probably be bored. Results are not typical. Mike's Law: For a lumber company employing two men and a cut-off saw, the marginal product of labor for any number of additional workers equals zero until the acquisition of another cut-off saw. Let's not even consider a chainsaw. - Mike Dennison [You could always schedule the saw, though - ed.] * joeyh cvs commits his home directory. Aaaaaa eeeeeeek joeyh: That is simply evil. Period. My family history begins with me, but yours ends with you. -- Iphicrates Do not overtax your powers. Talking Pinhead Blues: Oh, I LOST my ``HELLO KITTY'' DOLL and I get BAD reception on channel TWENTY-SIX!! Th'HOSTESS FACTORY is closin' down and I just heard ZASU PITTS has been DEAD for YEARS.. (sniff) My PLATFORM SHOE collection was CHEWED up by th' dog, ALEXANDER HAIG won't let me take a SHOWER 'til Easter ... (snurf) So I went to the kitchen, but WALNUT PANELING whup me upside mah HAID!! (on no, no, no.. Heh, heh) There's another way to survive. Mutual trust -- and help. -- Kirk, "Day of the Dove", stardate unknown So you think that money is the root of all evil. Have you ever asked what is the root of money? -- Ayn Rand It is necessary to have purpose. -- Alice #1, "I, Mudd", stardate 4513.3 Pie are not square. Pie are round. Cornbread are square. Madison's Inquiry: If you have to travel on the Titanic, why not go first class? Ten of the meanest cons in the state pen met in the corner of the yard to shoot some craps. The stakes were enormous, the tension palpable. When his turn came to shoot, Dutsky nervously plunked down his entire wad, shook the dice and rolled. A smile crossed his face as a seven showed up, but it quickly changed to horror as third die slipped out of his sleeve and fell to the ground with the two others. No one said a word. Finally, Killer Lucci picked up the third die, put it in his pocket and handed the others to Dutsky. "Roll 'em," Lucci said. "Your point is thirteen." Magic is always the best solution -- especially reliable magic. Alan Cox wrote: >> On any procmail new enough not to be full of security holes you set >Brain on, Imeant majordomo of course 8) You got me worried there for a brief (very brief) moment :-). -- Stephen R. van den Berg (AKA BuGless) Diseases for Kisses (Hyperkarma): A deeply rooted belief that punishment will somehow always be far greater than the crime: ozone holes for littering. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" "It was the Law of the Sea, they said. Civilization ends at the waterline. Beyond that, we all enter the food chain, and not always right at the top." -- Hunter S. Thompson If God wanted us to have a President, He would have sent us a candidate. -- Jerry Dreshfield It used to be the fun was in The capture and kill. In another place and time I did it all for thrills. -- Lust to Love If loving linux is wrong, I dont wanna be right. -- Topic for #LinuxGER Where it is a duty to worship the sun it is pretty sure to be a crime to examine the laws of heat. -- Christopher Morley Licensed and bonded. Vila: "I think I have just made the biggest mistake of my life." Orac: "It is unlikely. I would predict there are far greater mistakes waiting to be made by someone with your obvious talent for it." `Lasu' Releases SAG 0.3 -- Freeware Book Takes Paves For New World Order by staff writers ... The central Superhighway site called ``sunsite.unc.edu'' collapsed in the morning before the release. News about the release had been leaked by a German hacker group, Harmonious Hardware Hackers, who had cracked into the author's computer earlier in the week. They had got the release date wrong by one day, and caused dozens of eager fans to connect to the sunsite computer at the wrong time. ``No computer can handle that kind of stress,'' explained the mourning sunsite manager, Erik Troan. ``The spinning disks made the whole computer jump, and finally it crashed through the floor to the basement.'' Luckily, repairs were swift and the computer was working again the same evening. ``Thank God we were able to buy enough needles and thread and patch it together without major problems.'' The site has also installed a new throttle on the network pipe, allowing at most four clients at the same time, thus making a new crash less likely. ``The book is now in our Incoming folder'', says Troan, ``and you're all welcome to come and get it.'' -- Lars Wirzenius [comp.os.linux.announce] Do unto others before they undo you. ... whether it is better to spend a life not knowing what you want or to spend a life knowing exactly what you want and that you will never have it. -- Richard Shelton Conformity is the refuge of the unimaginative. Arnold's Laws of Documentation: (1) If it should exist, it doesn't. (2) If it does exist, it's out of date. (3) Only documentation for useless programs transcends the first two laws. Physician: One upon whom we set our hopes when ill and our dogs when well. -- Ambrose Bierce Love is the process of my leading you gently back to yourself. -- Saint Exupery Fine day for friends. So-so day for you. Arnold's Laws of Documentation: (1) If it should exist, it doesn't. (2) If it does exist, it's out of date. (3) Only documentation for useless programs transcends the first two laws. Writing is easy; all you do is sit staring at the blank sheet of paper until drops of blood form on your forehead. -- Gene Fowler You will be married within a year, and divorced within two. Easiest Color to Solve on a Rubik's Cube: Black. Simply remove all the little colored stickers on the cube, and each of side of the cube will now be the original color of the plastic underneath -- black. According to the instructions, this means the puzzle is solved. -- Steve Rubenstein Afternoon, n.: That part of the day we spend worrying about how we wasted the morning. Future looks spotty. You will spill soup in late evening. Cat, n.: Lapwarmer with built-in buzzer. Keep your laws off my body! Thirteen at a table is unlucky only when the hostess has only twelve chops. -- Groucho Marx Now let the song begin! Let us sing together Of sun, star, moon and mist, rain and cloudy weather, Light on the budding leag, dew on the feather, Wind on the open hill, bells on the heather, Reeds by the shady pool, lilies on the water: Old Tom Bombadil and the River-daughter! -- J. R. R. Tolkien How many Unix hacks does it take to change a light bulb? Let's see, can you use a shell script for that or does it need a C program? In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence ... in time every post tends to be occupied by an employee who is incompetent to carry out its duties ... Work is accomplished by those employees who have not yet reached their level of incompetence. -- Dr. Laurence J. Peter, "The Peter Principle" Have you seen the latest Japanese camera? Apparently it is so fast it can photograph an American with his mouth shut! Memory fault -- brain fried Most of us feel that marketing types are like a dangerous weapon - keep 'em unloaded and locked up in a cupboard, and only bring them out when you need them to do a job. -- Craig Sanders T-shirt of the Day: Head for the Mountains -- courtesy Anheuser-Busch beer Followup T-shirt of the Day (on the same scenic background): If you liked the mountains, head for the Busch! -- courtesy someone else A green hunting cap squeezed the top of the fleshy balloon of a head. The green earflaps, full of large ears and uncut hair and the fine bristles that grew in the ears themselvse, stuck out on either side like turn signals indicating two directions at once. Full, pursed lips protruded beneath the bushy black moustache and, at their corners, sank into little folds filled with disapproval and potato chip crumbs. In the shadow under the green visor of the cap Ignatius J. Reilly's supercilious blue and yellow eyes looked down upon the other people waiting under the clock at the D. H. Holmes department store, studying the crowd of people for signs of bad taste in dress. Several of the outfits, Ignatius noticed, were new enough and expensive enough to be properly considered offenses against taste and decency. Possession of anything new or expensive only reflected a person's lack of theology and geometry; it could even cast doubts upon one's soul. -- John Kennedy Toole, "Confederacy of Dunces" "There are things that are so serious that you can only joke about them" -- Heisenberg If there are self-made purgatories, then we all have to live in them. -- Spock, "This Side of Paradise", stardate 3417.7 I know it all. I just can't remember it all at once. Q: What is printed on the bottom of beer bottles in Minnesota? A: Open other end. All the world's a stage and most of us are desperately unrehearsed. -- Sean O'Casey "An organization dries up if you don't challenge it with growth." -- Mark Shepherd, former President and CEO of Texas Instruments my computer was once one of the building blocks of a great pyramid Column 1 Column 2 Column 3 0. integrated 0. management 0. options 1. total 1. organizational 1. flexibility 2. systematized 2. monitored 2. capability 3. parallel 3. reciprocal 3. mobility 4. functional 4. digital 4. programming 5. responsive 5. logistical 5. concept 6. optional 6. transitional 6. time-phase 7. synchronized 7. incremental 7. projection 8. compatible 8. third-generation 8. hardware 9. balanced 9. policy 9. contingency The procedure is simple. Think of any three-digit number, then select the corresponding buzzword from each column. For instance, number 257 produces "systematized logistical projection," a phrase that can be dropped into virtually any report with that ring of decisive, knowledgeable authority. "No one will have the remotest idea of what you're talking about," says Broughton, "but the important thing is that they're not about to admit it." -- Philip Broughton, "How to Win at Wordsmanship" Wisdom is rarely found on the best-seller list. "MacDonald has the gift on compressing the largest amount of words into the smallest amount of thoughts." -- Winston Churchill All great ideas are controversial, or have been at one time. Love means never having to say you're sorry. -- Eric Segal, "Love Story" That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. -- Ryan O'Neill, "What's Up Doc?" "It's ten o'clock... Do you know where your AI programs are?" -- Peter Oakley All constants are variables. Everyone is a genius. It's just that some people are too stupid to realize it. A well-known friend is a treasure. "We live, in a very kooky time." -- Herb Blashtfalt Don't be concerned, it will not harm you, It's only me pursuing something I'm not sure of, Across my dreams, with neptive wonder, I chase the bright elusive butterfly of love. Indomitable in retreat; invincible in advance; insufferable in victory. -- Winston Churchill, on General Montgomery The real reason large families benefit society is because at least a few of the children in the world shouldn't be raised by beginners. From too much love of living, From hope and fear set free, We thank with brief thanksgiving, Whatever gods may be, That no life lives forever, That dead men rise up never, That even the weariest river winds somewhere safe to sea. -- Swinburne Like winter snow on summer lawn, time past is time gone. A gentleman is a man who wouldn't hit a lady with his hat on. -- Evan Esar [ And why not? For why does she have his hat on? Ed.] It's the RINSE CYCLE!! They've ALL IGNORED the RINSE CYCLE!! He who knows, does not speak. He who speaks, does not know. -- Lao Tsu 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" Those who hate and fight must stop themselves -- otherwise it is not stopped. -- Spock, "Day of the Dove", stardate unknown 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" Sex is like air. It's only a big deal if you can't get any. "The New York Times is read by the people who run the country. The Washington Post is read by the people who think they run the country. The National Enquirer is read by the people who think Elvis is alive and running the country ..." -- Robert J Woodhead One is not superior merely because one sees the world as odious. -- Chateaubriand (1768-1848) [...] or some clown changed the chips on a board and not its name. (Don't laugh! Look at the SMC etherpower for that.) -- from /usr/src/linux/MAINTAINERS So much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens. -- William Carlos Williams, "The Red Wheel Barrow" "In short, _N is Richardian if, and only if, _N is not Richardian." Bagdikian's Observation: Trying to be a first-rate reporter on the average American newspaper is like trying to play Bach's "St. Matthew Passion" on a ukelele. Pandora's Rule: Never open a box you didn't close. If a man slept by day, he had little time to work. That was a satisfying notion to Escargot. -- "The Stone Giant", James P. Blaylock An engineer, a physicist and a mathematician find themselves in an anecdote, indeed an anecdote quite similar to many that you have no doubt already heard. After some observations and rough calculations the engineer realizes the situation and starts laughing. A few minutes later the physicist understands too and chuckles to himself happily as he now has enough experimental evidence to publish a paper. This leaves the mathematician somewhat perplexed, as he had observed right away that he was the subject of an anecdote, and deduced quite rapidly the presence of humour from similar anecdotes, but considers this anecdote to be too trivial a corollary to be significant, let alone funny. A woman can look both moral and exciting -- if she also looks as if it were quite a struggle. -- Edna Ferber 17th Rule of Friendship: A friend will refrain from telling you he picked up the same amount of life insurance coverage you did for half the price when yours is noncancellable. -- Esquire, May 1977 We knew from experience that the essence of communal computing, as supplied by remote-access, time-shared machines, is not just to type programs into a terminal instead of a keypunch, but to encourage close communication. -- Dennis Ritchie 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." Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people. -- Oscar Wilde He who steps on others to reach the top has good balance. If you stew apples like cranberries, they taste more like prunes than rhubarb does. -- Groucho Marx As for the women, though we scorn and flout 'em, We may live with, but cannot live without 'em. -- Frederic Reynolds You must be the change you wish to see in the world. -- Mahatma Gandhi Extract from Official Sweepstakes Rules: NO PURCHASE REQUIRED TO CLAIM YOUR PRIZE To claim your prize without purchase, do the following: (a) Carefully cut out your computer-printed name and address from upper right hand corner of the Prize Claim Form. (b) Affix computer-printed name and address -- with glue or cellophane tape (no staples or paper clips) -- to a 3x5 inch index card. (c) Also cut out the "No" paragraph (lower left hand corner of Prize Claim Form) and affix it to the 3x5 card below your address label. (d) Then print on your 3x5 card, above your computer-printed name and address the words "CARTER & VAN PEEL SWEEPSTAKES" (Use all capital letters.) (e) Finally place 3x5 card (without bending) into a plain envelope [NOTE: do NOT use the the Official Prize Claim and CVP Perfume Reply Envelope or you may be disqualified], and mail to: CVP, Box 1320, Westbury, NY 11595. Print this address correctly. Comply with above instructions carefully and completely or you may be disqualified from receiving your prize. The final delusion is the belief that one has lost all delusions. -- Maurice Chapelain, "Main courante" The economy depends about as much on economists as the weather does on weather forecasters. -- Jean-Paul Kauffmann How can you be in two places at once when you're not anywhere at all? He that teaches himself has a fool for a master. -- Benjamin Franklin has /usr/bin/emacs been put into /etc/shells yet? :P Armanism: After Giorgio Armani; an obsession with mimicking the seamless and (more importantly) *controlled* ethos of Italian couture. Like Japanese Minimalism, Armanism reflects a profound inner need for control. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" PURGE COMPLETE. "All God's children are not beautiful. Most of God's children are, in fact, barely presentable." -- Fran Lebowitz You have a strong appeal for members of the opposite sex. It is illegal to say "Oh, Boy" in Jonesboro, Georgia. Even bytes get lonely for a little bit. The cow is nothing but a machine which makes grass fit for us people to eat. -- John McNulty No purchase necessary. If you stew apples like cranberries, they taste more like prunes than rhubarb does. -- Groucho Marx The pollution's at that awkward stage. Too thick to navigate and too thin to cultivate. -- Doug Sneyd Anyone who goes to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined. -- Samuel Goldwyn The morning sun when it's in your face really shows your age, But that don't bother me none; in my eyes you're everything. I know I keep you amused, But I feel I'm being used. Oh, Maggie, I wish I'd never seen your face. You took me away from home, Just to save you from being alone; You stole my heart, and that's what really hurts. I suppose I could collect my books and get on back to school, Or steal my daddy's cue and make a living out of playing pool, Or find myself a rock 'n' roll band, That needs a helping hand, Oh, Maggie I wish I'd never seen your face. You made a first-class fool out of me, But I'm as blind as a fool can be. You stole my soul, and that's a pain I can do without. -- Rod Stewart, "Maggie May" double-blind experiment, n: An experiment in which the chief researcher believes he is fooling both the subject and the lab assistant. Often accompanied by a strong belief in the tooth fairy. On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog. -- Cartoon caption Children are unpredictable. You never know what inconsistency they're going to catch you in next. -- Franklin P. Jones He who laughs last -- missed the punch line. The goal of science is to build better mousetraps. The goal of nature is to build better mice. Women, deceived by men, want to marry them; it is a kind of revenge as good as any other. -- Philippe De Remi We don't believe in rheumatism and true love until after the first attack. -- Marie Ebner von Eschenbach Talk is cheap because supply always exceeds demand. I either want less decadence or more chance to participate in it. Poorman's Rule: When you pull a plastic garbage bag from its handy dispenser package, you always get hold of the closed end and try to pull it open. Sturgeon's Law: 90% of everything is crud. All of the true things I am about to tell you are shameless lies. -- The Book of Bokonon / Kurt Vonnegut Jr. When the saleman's car broke down, he walked to the nearest farmhouse to ask if he could stay the night. The farmer agreed to put him up. "I live alone," he continued, "you can have the bedroom at the top of the stairs, to the right." "Oh, never mind," the disappointed salesman said. "I think I'm in the wrong joke." Come live with me, and be my love, And we will some new pleasures prove Of golden sands, and crystal brooks, With silken lines, and silver hooks. -- John Donne All the evidence concerning the universe has not yet been collected, so there's still hope. I have never understood the female capacity to avoid a direct answer to any question. -- Spock, "This Side of Paradise", stardate 3417.3 "I said, "Preacher, give me strength for round 5." He said,"What you need is to grow up, son." I said,"Growin' up leads to growin' old, And then to dying, and to me that don't sound like much fun." -- John Cougar, "The Authority Song" Neckties strangle clear thinking. -- Lin Yutang * bma_home gropes you "oups, wrong channel" quit groping me you know you like it. actually, it was "grope me baby" touch my son and you die, bma ;) gecko-: but your wife is ok? Gratitude, like love, is never a dependable international emotion. -- Joseph Alsop "I'd love to go out with you, but there are important world issues that need worrying about." ok, I will not marry Jo-Con-El's cow. David Letterman's "Things we can be proud of as Americans": * Greatest number of citizens who have actually boarded a UFO * Many newspapers feature "JUMBLE" * Hourly motel rates * Vast majority of Elvis movies made here * Didn't just give up right away during World War II like some countries we could mention * Goatees & Van Dykes thought to be worn only by weenies * Our well-behaved golf professionals * Fabulous babes coast to coast Wedding is destiny, and hanging likewise. -- John Heywood 'Course, that doesn't work when 'a' contains parentheses. -- Larry Wall in <199710211647.JAA17957@wall.org> Against Idleness and Mischief How doth the little busy bee How skillfully she builds her cell! Improve each shining hour, How neat she spreads the wax! And gather honey all the day And labours hard to store it well From every opening flower! With the sweet food she makes. In works of labour or of skill In books, or work, or healthful play, I would be busy too; Let my first years be passed, For Satan finds some mischief still That I may give for every day For idle hands to do. Some good account at last. -- Isaac Watts, 1674-1748 Noncombatant: A dead Quaker. -- Ambrose Bierce I woke up this morning and discovered that everything in my apartment had been stolen and replaced with an exact replica. I told my roommate, "Isn't this amazing? Everything in the apartment has been stolen and replaced with an exact replica." He said, "Do I know you?" -- Steven Wright BARRY ... That was the most HEART-WARMING rendition of "I DID IT MY WAY" I've ever heard!! It looks like blind screaming hedonism won out. The X Window System: The standard UNIX graphical environment. With Linux, this is usually XFree86 (http://www.xfree86.org). You may call it X, XFree, the X Window System, XF86, or a host of other things. Call it 'XWindows' and someone will smack you and you will have deserved it. Nothing is more admirable than the fortitude with which millionaires tolerate the disadvantages of their wealth. -- Nero Wolfe The one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception a neccessity. -- Oscar Wilde Love, which is quickly kindled in a gentle heart, seized this one for the fair form that was taken from me-and the way of it afficts me still. Love, which absolves no loved one from loving, seized me so strongly with delight in him, that, as you see, it does not leave me even now. Love brought us to one death. -- La Divina Commedia: Inferno V, vv. 100-06 The ratio of literacy to illiteracy is a constant, but nowadays the illiterates can read. -- Alberto Moravia Murphy's Law is recursive. Washing your car to make it rain doesn't work. hey did you fall off your pirch or something? me? heh. Just don't compare it with a real language, or you'll be unhappy... :-) -- Larry Wall in <1992May12.190238.5667@netlabs.com> I wonder if I ought to tell them about my PREVIOUS LIFE as a COMPLETE STRANGER? It is only by risking our persons from one hour to another that we live at all. And often enough our faith beforehand in an uncertified result is the only thing that makes the result come true. -- William James We are using Linux daily to UP our productivity - so UP yours! -- Adapted from Pat Paulsen by Joe Sloan ... My pants just went on a wild rampage through a Long Island Bowling Alley!! /* * [...] Note that 120 sec is defined in the protocol as the maximum * possible RTT. I guess we'll have to use something other than TCP * to talk to the University of Mars. * PAWS allows us longer timeouts and large windows, so once implemented * ftp to mars will work nicely. */ (from /usr/src/linux/net/inet/tcp.c, concerning RTT [retransmission timeout]) Cat, n.: Lapwarmer with built-in buzzer. Anyone stupid enough to be caught by the police is probably guilty. I HAVE to buy a new "DODGE MISER" and two dozen JORDACHE JEANS because my viewscreen is "USER-FRIENDLY"!! netgod: My calculator has more registers than the x86, and -- thats- sad My boy is a mean kid. I came home the other day and saw him taping worms to the sidewalk, he sits there and watches the birds get hernias. Well, only last Christmas I gave him a B-B gun and he gave me a sweatshirt with a bulls-eye on the back. I told my kids, "Someday, you'll have kids of your own." One of them said, "So will you." -- Rodney Dangerfield perl < /dev/bdsm you have a /dev/bdsm? sure, it's a pseudosadomasochistic random number generator You are transported to a room where you are faced by a wizard who points to you and says, "Them's fighting words!" You immediately get attacked by all sorts of denizens of the museum: there is a cobra chewing on your leg, a troglodyte is bashing your brains out with a gold nugget, a crocodile is removing large chunks of flesh from you, a rhinoceros is goring you with his horn, a sabre-tooth cat is busy trying to disembowel you, you are being trampled by a large mammoth, a vampire is sucking you dry, a Tyrannosaurus Rex is sinking his six inch long fangs into various parts of your anatomy, a large bear is dismembering your body, a gargoyle is bouncing up and down on your head, a burly troll is tearing you limb from limb, several dire wolves are making mince meat out of your torso, and the wizard is about to transport you to the corner of Westwood and Broxton. Oh dear, you seem to have gotten yourself killed, as well. You scored 0 out of 250 possible points. That gives you a ranking of junior beginning adventurer. To achieve the next higher rating, you need to score 32 more points. Q: Why did the chicken cross the road? A: He was giving it last rites. Around the turn of this century, a composer named Camille Saint-Saens wrote a satirical zoological-fantasy called "Le Carnaval des Animaux." Aside from one movement of this piece, "The Swan", Saint-Saens didn't allow this work to be published or even performed until a year had elapsed after his death. (He died in 1921.) Most of us know the "Swan" movement rather well, with its smooth, flowing cello melody against a calm background; but I've been having this fantasy... What if he had written this piece with lyrics, as a song to be sung? And, further, what if he had accompanied this song with a musical saw? (This instrument really does exist, often played by percussionists!) Then the piece would be better known as: SAINT-SAENS' SAW SONG "SWAN"! My mother wants grandchildren, so I said, "Mom, go for it!" -- Sue Murphy One big pile is better than two little piles. -- Arlo Guthrie "You say there are two types of people?" "Yes, those who separate people into two groups and those that don't." "Wrong. There are three groups: Those who separate people into three groups. Those who don't separate people into groups. Those who can't decide." "Wait a minute, what about people who separate people into two groups?" "Oh. Okay, then there are four groups." "Aren't you then separating people into four groups?" "Yeah." "So then there's a fifth group, right?" "You know, the problem is these idiots who can't make up their minds." Avoid reality at all costs. Following When the great man learns the Way, he follows it with diligence; When the common man learns the Way, he follows it on occasion; When the mean man learns the Way, he laughs out loud; Those who do not laugh, do not learn at all. Therefore it is said: Who understands the Way seems foolish; Who progresses on the Way seems to fail; Who follows the Way seems to wander. For the finest harmony appears plain; The brightest truth appears coloured; The richest character appears incomplete; The bravest heart appears meek; The simplest nature appears inconstant. The square, perfected, has no corner; Music, perfected, has no melody; Love, perfected, has no climax; Art, perfected, has no meaning. The Way can be neither sensed nor known: It transmits sensation and transcends knowledge. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" 2fort5 sucks enough to have its own gravity ... I tell ya, I was an ugly kid. I was so ugly that my dad kept the kid's picture that came with the wallet he bought. -- Rodney Dangerfield Life is a game of bridge -- and you've just been finessed. Keep cool. Always leave room to add an explanation if it doesn't work out. I can't mate in captivity. -- Gloria Steinem, on why she has never married. But you who live on dreams, you are better pleased with the sophistical reasoning and frauds of talkers about great and uncertain matters than those who speak of certain and natural matters, not of such lofty nature. -- Leonardo Da Vinci, "The Codex on the Flight of Birds" In the Old West a wagon train is crossing the plains. As night falls the wagon train forms a circle, and a campfire is lit in the middle. After everyone has gone to sleep two lone cavalry officers stand watch over the camp. After several hours of quiet, they hear war drums starting from a nearby Indian village they had passed during the day. The drums get louder and louder. Finally one soldier turns to the other and says, "I don't like the sound of those drums." Suddenly, they hear a cry come from the Indian camp: "IT'S NOT OUR REGULAR DRUMMER." The Celts invented two things, Whiskey and self-destruction. I have a map of the United States. It's actual size. I spent last summer folding it. People ask me where I live, and I say, "E6". -- Steven Wright Keep cool; process promptly. If you wants to get elected president, you'se got to think up some memoraboble homily so's school kids can be pestered into memorizin' it, even if they don't know what it means. -- Walt Kelly, "The Pogo Party" The carbonyl is polarized, The delta end is plus. The nucleophile will thus attack, The carbon nucleus. Addition makes an alcohol, Of types there are but three. It makes a bond, to correspond, From C to shining C. -- Prof. Frank Westheimer, to "America the Beautiful" You had mail, but the super-user read it, and deleted it! Ever wonder if taxation without representation might have been cheaper? With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter. -- William Lloyd Garrison ... 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" "Give me enough medals, and I'll win any war." -- Napoleon Albrecht's Law: Social innovations tend to the level of minimum tolerable well-being. "Problem solving under linux has never been the circus that it is under AIX." (By Pete Ehlke in comp.unix.aix) Somewhere in suburban Honolulu, an unemployed bellhop is whipping up a batch of illegal psilocybin chop suey!! Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life. -- Eric Hoffer The only "intuitive" interface is the nipple. After that, it's all learned. (Bruce Ediger, bediger@teal.csn.org, in comp.os.linux.misc, on X interfaces.) Politics, like religion, hold up the torches of matrydom to the reformers of error. -- Thomas Jefferson "The glory of creation is in its infinite diversity." "And in the way our differences combine to create meaning and beauty." -- Dr. Miranda Jones and Spock, "Is There in Truth No Beauty?", stardate 5630.8 Oblivion together does not frighten me, beloved. -- Thalassa (in Anne Mulhall's body), "Return to Tomorrow", stardate 4770.3. My mother once said to me, "Elwood," (she always called me Elwood) "Elwood, in this world you must be oh so smart or oh so pleasant." For years I tried smart. I recommend pleasant. -- Elwood P. Dowde, "Harvey" Women are all alike. When they're maids they're mild as milk: once make 'em wives, and they lean their backs against their marriage certificates, and defy you. -- Jerrold Lots of folks confuse bad management with destiny. -- Frank Hubbard Sometimes I wonder if I'm in my right mind. Then it passes off and I'm as intelligent as ever. -- Samuel Beckett, "Endgame" "...'fire' does not matter, 'earth' and 'air' and 'water' do not matter. 'I' do not matter. No word matters. But man forgets reality and remembers words. The more words he remembers, the cleverer do his fellows esteem him. He looks upon the great transformations of the world, but he does not see them as they were seen when man looked upon reality for the first time. Their names come to his lips and he smiles as he tastes them, thinking he knows them in the naming." -- Siddartha, _Lord_of_Light_ by Roger Zelazny Its name is Public Opinion. It is held in reverence. It settles everything. Some think it is the voice of God. -- Mark Twain Hey dol! merry dol! ring a dong dillo! Ring a dong! hop along! fal lal the willow! Tom Bom, jolly Tom, Tom Bombadillo! -- J. R. R. Tolkien We seldom repent talking too little, but very often talking too much. -- Jean de la Bruyere To A Quick Young Fox Why jog exquisite bulk, fond crazy vamp, Daft buxom jonquil, zephyr's gawky vice? Guy fed by work, quiz Jove's xanthic lamp-- Zow! Qualms by deja vu gyp fox-kin thrice. -- Lazy Dog Now I'm concentrating on a specific tank battle toward the end of World War II! If I traveled to the end of the rainbow As Dame Fortune did intend, Murphy would be there to tell me The pot's at the other end. -- Bert Whitney I'm having a BIG BANG THEORY!! Murphy's Law is recursive. Washing your car to make it rain doesn't work. Expect the worst, it's the least you can do. If this is timesharing, give me my share right now. Keep the phase, baby. The one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception a neccessity. -- Oscar Wilde I think that I shall never see A thing as lovely as a tree. But as you see the trees have gone They went this morning with the dawn. A logging firm from out of town Came and chopped the trees all down. But I will trick those dirty skunks And write a brand new poem called 'Trunks'. Mirrors should reflect a little before throwing back images. -- Jean Cocteau Hope is a good breakfast, but it is a bad supper. -- Francis Bacon weapon, n.: An index of the lack of development of a culture. QOTD: "The baby was so ugly they had to hang a pork chop around its neck to get the dog to play with it." You teach best what you most need to learn. COMPASS [for the CDC-6000 series] is the sort of assembler one expects from a corporation whose president codes in octal. -- J. N. Gray Not responsible for merchandise left over 30 days. Two wrongs are only the beginning. -- Kohn Strangelove Reproduction: Having children to make up for the fact that one no longer believes in the future. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Disco is to music what Etch-A-Sketch is to art. Subject: Bug#42432: debian-policy: Proposal for CTV for Draft for Proof of Concept for Draft for Proposal for Proposal for CTV for a CTV to decide on a proposal for a CTV for the CTV on whether or not we shoud have a CTV on the /usr/doc to /usr/share/doc transition now, or later. -- Ed Lang "The greatest warriors are the ones who fight for peace." -- Holly Near Everybody needs a little love sometime; stop hacking and fall in love! Show your affection, which will probably meet with pleasant response. It's a poor workman who blames his tools. Sick Building Migration: The tendency of younger workers to leave or avoid jobs in unhealthy office environments or workplaces affected by the Sick Building Syndrome. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" BOO! We changed Coke again! BLEAH! BLEAH! While there's life, there's hope. -- Publius Terentius Afer (Terence) Scientists will study your brain to learn more about your distant cousin, Man. To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, be nothing. -- Elbert Hubbard I'd never join any club that would have the likes of me as a member. -- Groucho Marx Just when you thought you were winning the rat race, along comes a faster rat!! 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. * joeyh installs debian using only his big toe, for a change of pace -- in #debian-boot To be successful, a woman has to be much better at her job than a man. -- Golda Meir People respond to people who respond. People who take cat naps don't usually sleep in a cat's cradle. "Falling in love makes smoking pot all day look like the ultimate in restraint." -- Dave Sim, author of Cerebrus. One good reason why computers can do more work than people is that they never have to stop and answer the phone. Looking for a cool one after a long, dusty ride, the drifter strode into the saloon. As he made his way through the crowd to the bar, a man galloped through town screaming, "Big Mike's comin'! Run fer yer lives!" Suddenly, the saloon doors burst open. An enormous man, standing over eight feet tall and weighing an easy 400 pounds, rode in on a bull, using a rattlesnake for a whip. Grabbing the drifter by the arm and throwing him over the bar, the giant thundered, "Gimme a drink!" The terrified man handed over a bottle of whiskey, which the man guzzled in one gulp and then smashed on the bar. He then stood aghast as the man stuffed the broken bottle in his mouth, munched broken glass and smacked his lips with relish. "Can I, ah, uh, get you another, sir?" the drifter stammered. "Naw, I gotta git outa here, boy," the man grunted. "Big Mike's a-comin'." Ditat Deus. [God enriches] The more a man is imbued with the ordered regularity of all events, the firmer becomes his conviction that there is no room left by the side of this ordered regularity for causes of a different nature. For him neither the rule of human nor the rule of divine will exists as an independent cause of natural events. To be sure, the doctrine of a personal God interfering with natural events could never be refuted, in the real sense, by science, for this doctrine can always take refuge in those domains in which scientific knowledge has not yet been able to set foot. But I am persuaded that such behavior on the part of the representatives of religion would not only be unworthy but also fatal. For a doctrine which is able to maintain itself not in clear light, but only in the dark, will of necessity lose its effect on mankind, with incalculable harm to human progress. In their struggle for the ethical good, teachers of religion must have the stature to give up the doctrine of a personal God, that is, give up that source of fear and hope which in the past placed such vast powers in the hands of priests. In their labors they will have to avail themselves of those forces which are capable of cultivating the Good, the True, and the Beautiful in humanity itself. This is, to be sure, a more difficult but an incomparably more worthy task. -- Albert Einstein I program, therefore I am. Protect from light. One Bell System - it sometimes works. When one burns one's bridges, what a very nice fire it makes. -- Dylan Thomas < sam> /.ing an issue is like asking an infinite number of monkeys for advice -- in #debian-devel To iterate is human, to recurse, divine. -- Robert Heller A classic is something that everyone wants to have read and nobody wants to read. -- Mark Twain, "The Disappearance of Literature" When does later become never? Apples have meant trouble since eden. -- MaDsen Wikholm, mwikholm@at8.abo.fi Life is a hospital in which every patient is possessed by the desire to change his bed. -- Charles Baudelaire Imbesi's Law with Freeman's Extension: In order for something to become clean, something else must become dirty; but you can get everything dirty without getting anything clean. "Atomic batteries to power, turbines to speed." -- Robin, The Boy Wonder It is difficult to produce a television documentary that is both incisive and probing when every twelve minutes one is interrupted by twelve dancing rabbits singing about toilet paper. -- Rod Serling War is an equal opportunity destroyer. Cobol programmers are down in the dumps. Androphobia: Fear of men. Have no friends not equal to yourself. -- Confucius Woke up this mornin' an' I had myself a beer, Yeah, Ah woke up this mornin' an' I had myself a beer The future's uncertain and the end is always near. -- Jim Morrison, "Roadhouse Blues" guru, n: A computer owner who can read the manual. All heiresses are beautiful. -- John Dryden Someone is unenthusiastic about your work. Do not meddle in the affairs of troff, for it is subtle and quick to anger. Peterson's Admonition: When you think you're going down for the third time -- just remember that you may have counted wrong. Write a wise saying and your name will live forever. -- Anonymous "Where humor is concerned there are no standards -- no one can say what is good or bad, although you can be sure that everyone will. -- John Kenneth Galbraith Keep up the good work! But please don't ask me to help. Tonight's the night: Sleep in a eucalyptus tree. Moore's Constant: Everybody sets out to do something, and everybody does something, but no one does what he sets out to do. There is no statute of limitations on stupidity. Today is a good day to bribe a high-ranking public official. Lo! Men have become the tool of their tools. -- Henry David Thoreau For fast-acting relief, try slowing down. Close cover before striking. A musician of more ambition than talent composed an elegy at the death of composer Edward MacDowell. She played the elegy for the pianist Josef Hoffman, then asked his opinion. "Well, it's quite nice," he replied, but don't you think it would be better if..." "If what?" asked the composer. "If ... if you had died and MacDowell had written the elegy?" Absence in love is like water upon fire; a little quickens, but much extinguishes it. -- Hannah More "I may kid around about drugs, but really, I take them seriously." -- Doctor Graper Pohl's law: Nothing is so good that somebody, somewhere, will not hate it. Coach: What's up, Norm? Norm: Corners of my mouth, Coach. -- Cheers, Fortune and Men's Weights Coach: What's shaking, Norm? Norm: All four cheeks and a couple of chins, Coach. -- Cheers, Snow Job Coach: Beer, Normie? Norm: Uh, Coach, I dunno, I had one this week. Eh, why not, I'm still young. -- Cheers, Snow Job The joys of love made her human and the agonies of love destroyed her. -- Spock, "Requiem for Methuselah", stardate 5842.8 You will be successful in your work. A novice asked the Master: "Here is a programmer that never designs, documents, or tests his programs. Yet all who know him consider him one of the best programmers in the world. Why is this?" The Master replies: "That programmer has mastered the Tao. He has gone beyond the need for design; he does not become angry when the system crashes, but accepts the universe without concern. He has gone beyond the need for documentation; he no longer cares if anyone else sees his code. He has gone beyond the need for testing; each of his programs are perfect within themselves, serene and elegant, their purpose self-evident. Truly, he has entered the mystery of the Tao." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" This PORCUPINE knows his ZIPCODE ... And he has "VISA"!! I am just a nice, clean-cut Mongolian boy. -- Yul Brynner, 1956 He hath eaten me out of house and home. -- William Shakespeare, "Henry IV" For those who like this sort of thing, this is the sort of thing they like. -- Abraham Lincoln The three biggest software lies: (1) *Of course* we'll give you a copy of the source. (2) *Of course* the third party vendor we bought that from will fix the microcode. (3) Beta test site? No, *of course* you're not a beta test site. In the future, you're going to get computers as prizes in breakfast cereals. You'll throw them out because your house will be littered with them. Repel them. Repel them. Induce them to relinquish the spheroid. -- Indiana University football cheer Send your questions to ``ASK ZIPPY'', Box 40474, San Francisco, CA 94140, USA I stayed up all night playing poker with tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died. -- Steven Wright Beware of a tall black man with one blond shoe. What I tell you three times is true. -- Lewis Carroll The secret of healthy hitchhiking is to eat junk food. My uncle Murray conquered Egypt in 53 B.C. And I can prove it too!! A bad marriage is like a horse with a broken leg, you can shoot the horse, but it don't fix the leg. Plus ,ca change, plus c'est la m^eme chose. [The more things change, the more they remain the same.] -- Alphonse Karr, "Les Gu^epes" I feel sorry for your brain... all alone in that great big head... It's just a jump to the left And then a step to the right. Put your hands on your hips And pull your knees in tight. It's the pelvic thrust That really gets you insa-a-a-a-ane LET'S DO THE TIME WARP AGAIN! -- Rocky Horror Picture Show Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. -- Henry David Thoreau Recurving: Leaving one job to take another that pays less but places one back on the learning curve. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" We thrive on euphemism. We call multi-megaton bombs "Peace-keepers", closet size apartments "efficient" and incomprehensible artworks "innovative". In fact, "euphemism" has become a euphemism for "bald-faced lie". And now, here are the euphemisms so colorfully employed in Personal Ads: EUPHEMISM REALITY ------------------- ------------------------- Excited about life's journey No concept of reality Spiritually evolved Oversensitive Moody Manic-depressive Soulful Quiet manic-depressive Poet Boring manic-depressive Sultry/Sensual Easy Uninhibited Lacking basic social skills Unaffected and earthy Slob and lacking basic social skills Irreverent Nasty and lacking basic social skills Very human Quasimodo's best friend Swarthy Sweaty even when cold or standing still Spontaneous/Eclectic Scatterbrained Flexible Desperate Aging child Self-centered adult Youthful Over 40 and trying to deny it Good sense of humor Watches a lot of television LOAD "LINUX",8,1 -- Topic on #LinuxGER Boomer Envy: Envy of material wealth and long-range material security accrued by older members of the baby boom generation by virtue of fortunate births. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Don't change the reason, just change the excuses! -- Joe Cointment Never sleep with a woman whose troubles are worse than your own. -- Nelson Algren When a child is taught ... its programmed with simple instructions -- and at some point, if its mind develops properly, it exceeds the sum of what it was taught, thinks independently. -- Dr. Richard Daystrom, "The Ultimate Computer", stardate 4731.3. The search for the perfect martini is a fraud. The perfect martini is a belt of gin from the bottle; anything else is the decadent trappings of civilization. -- T.K. Slaves are generally expected to sing as well as to work ... I did not, when a slave, understand the deep meanings of those rude, and apparently incoherent songs. I was myself within the circle, so that I neither saw nor heard as those without might see and hear. They told a tale which was then altogether beyond my feeble comprehension: they were tones, loud, long and deep, breathing the prayer and complaint of souls boiling over with the bitterest anguish. Every tone was a testimony against slavery, and a prayer to God for deliverance from chains. -- Frederick Douglass Children begin by loving their parents. After a time they judge them. Rarely, if ever, do they forgive them. -- Oscar Wilde He that is giddy thinks the world turns round. -- William Shakespeare, "The Taming of the Shrew" I'm free -- and freedom tastes of reality. -- The Who The solution to a problem changes the nature of the problem. -- Peer Pushing 30 is exercise enough. And furthermore, my bowling average is unimpeachable!!! Courtship to marriage, as a very witty prologue to a very dull play. -- William Congreve "If it's not loud, it doesn't work!" -- Blank Reg, from "Max Headroom" gossip, n.: Hearing something you like about someone you don't. -- Earl Wilson Gauls! We have nothing to fear; except perhaps that the sky may fall on our heads tomorrow. But as we all know, tomorrow never comes!! -- Adventures of Asterix * Dry-ice can't code his way out of a paper bag dry-ice: int main() { ExitPaperBag(); return 0; } Is that how that's done then? *takes notes* The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits. What is the robbing of a bank compared to the founding of a bank? -- Bertold Brecht "Luke, I'm yer father, eh. Come over to the dark side, you hoser." -- Dave Thomas, "Strange Brew" I have seen these EGG EXTENDERS in my Supermarket ... I have read the INSTRUCTIONS ... If God is dead, who will save the Queen? Come quickly, I am tasting stars! -- Dom Perignon, upon discovering champagne. I'm so broke I can't even pay attention. Am I elected yet? Many of the convicted thieves Parker has met began their life of crime after taking college Computer Science courses. -- Roger Rapoport, "Programs for Plunder", Omni, March 1981 The amount of time between slipping on the peel and landing on the pavement is precisely 1 bananosecond. "I've finally learned what `upward compatible' means. It means we get to keep all our old mistakes." -- Dennie van Tassel The number of computer scientists in a room is inversely proportional to the number of bugs in their code. But it's real. And if it's real it can be affected ... we may not be able to break it, but, I'll bet you credits to Navy Beans we can put a dent in it. -- deSalle, "Catspaw", stardate 3018.2 I'm so miserable without you, it's almost like you're here. Shah, shah! Ayatollah you so! Anything worth doing is worth overdoing. 'Twas the night before crisis, and all through the house, Not a program was working not even a browse. The programmers were wrung out too mindless to care, Knowing chances of cutover hadn't a prayer. The users were nestled all snug in their beds, While visions of inquiries danced in their heads. When out in the lobby there arose such a clatter, I sprang from my tube to see what was the matter. And what to my wondering eyes should appear, But a Super Programmer, oblivious to fear. More rapid than eagles, his programs they came, And he whistled and shouted and called them by name; On Update! On Add! On Inquiry! On Delete! On Batch Jobs! On Closing! On Functions Complete! His eyes were glazed over, his fingers were lean, From Weekends and nights in front of a screen. A wink of his eye, and a twist of his head, Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread... -- "Twas the Night before Crisis" To stay young requires unceasing cultivation of the ability to unlearn old falsehoods. -- Lazarus Long, "Time Enough For Love" Math is like love -- a simple idea but it can get complicated. -- R. Drabek "Dump the condiments. If we are to be eaten, we don't need to taste good." -- "Visionaries" cartoon Rules for Writers: Avoid run-on sentences they are hard to read. Don't use no double negatives. Use the semicolon properly, always use it where it is appropriate; and never where it isn't. Reserve the apostrophe for it's proper use and omit it when its not needed. No sentence fragments. Avoid commas, that are unnecessary. Eschew dialect, irregardless. And don't start a sentence with a conjunction. Hyphenate between sy-llables and avoid un-necessary hyphens. Write all adverbial forms correct. Don't use contractions in formal writing. Writing carefully, dangling participles must be avoided. It is incumbent on us to avoid archaisms. Steer clear of incorrect forms of verbs that have snuck in the language. Never, ever use repetitive redundancies. If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times, resist hyperbole. Also, avoid awkward or affected alliteration. Don't string too many prepositional phrases together unless you are walking through the valley of the shadow of death. "Avoid overuse of 'quotation "marks."'" Say "twenty-three-skiddoo" to logout. Multics is security spelled sideways. The bigger the theory the better. It is very vulgar to talk like a dentist when one isn't a dentist. It produces a false impression. -- Oscar Wilde. Lucas' Law: Good will always win, because evil hires the _stupid_ engineers. Garbage In -- Gospel Out. Fifty flippant frogs Walked by on flippered feet And with their slime they made the time Unnaturally fleet. "We have the right to survive!" "Not by killing others." -- Deela and Kirk, "Wink of An Eye", stardate 5710.5 Lonely men seek companionship. Lonely women sit at home and wait. They never meet. Someone fix it. committed Despair: Mercury? Knghtbrd: he's tired, made a mistake, wanted someone to undo it. Despair: so you had him committed? Knghtbrd: well, dedicated anyways. The first is to ensure your partner understands that nature has root privileges - nature doesn't have to make sense. -- Telsa Gwynne Hartley's First Law: You can lead a horse to water, but if you can get him to float on his back, you've got something. Gratitude and treachery are merely the two extremities of the same procession. You have seen all of it that is worth staying for when the band and the gaudy officials have gone by. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" The New England Journal of Medicine reports that 9 out of 10 doctors agree that 1 out of 10 doctors is an idiot. Scientists still know less about what attracts men than they do about what attracts mosquitoes. -- Dr. Joyce Brothers, "What Every Woman Should Know About Men" I've given up reading books; I find it takes my mind off myself. "... I should explain that I was wearing a black velvet cape that was supposed to make me look like the dashing, romantic Zorro but which actually made me look like a gigantic bat wearing glasses ..." -- Dave Barry, "The Wet Zorro Suit and Other Turning Points in l'Amour" A pat on the back is only a few centimeters from a kick in the pants. ...cyberpunk wants to see the mind as mechanistic & duplicable, challenging basic assumptions about the nature of individuality & self. That seems all the better reason to assume that cyberpunk art & music is essentially mindless garbagio. Willy certainly addressed this idea in "Count Zero," with Katatonenkunst, the automatic box-maker and the girl's observation that the real art was the building of the machine itself, rather than its output. -- Eliot Handelman There's one fool at least in every married couple. HR 3128. Omnibus Budget Reconciliation, Fiscal 1986. Martin, R-Ill., motion that the House recede from its disagreement to the Senate amendment making changes in the bill to reduce fiscal 1986 deficits. The Senate amendment was an amendment to the House amendment to the Senate amendment to the House amendment to the Senate amendment to the bill. The original Senate amendment was the conference agreement on the bill. Agreed to. -- Albuquerque Journal A list is only as strong as its weakest link. -- Don Knuth Whatever women do they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily this is not difficult. -- Charlotte Whitton THE DAILY PLANET SUPERMAN SAVES DESSERT! Plans to "Eat it later" The reader this message encounters not failing to understand is cursed. Someone will try to honk your nose today. Many people are secretly interested in life. A man with one watch knows what time it is. A man with two watches is never quite sure. The two oldest professions in the world have been ruined by amateurs. -- G. B. Shaw We are now enjoying total mutual interaction in an imaginary hot tub ... Scintillate, scintillate, globule vivific, Fain how I pause at your nature specific, Loftily poised in the ether capacious, Highly resembling a gem carbonaceous. Scintillate, scintillate, globule vivific, Fain how I pause at your nature specific. There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in their home. -- Ken Olsen (President of Digital Equipment Corporation), Convention of the World Future Society, in Boston, 1977 "What do you give a man who has everything?" the pretty teenager asked her mother. "Encouragement, dear," she replied. The curse of the Irish is not that they don't know the words to a song -- it's that they know them *___all*. -- Susan Dooley Good day for a change of scene. Repaper the bedroom wall. "No, `Eureka' is Greek for `This bath is too hot.'" -- Dr. Who "If you don't want your dog to have bad breath, do what I do: Pour a little Lavoris in the toilet." -- Jay Leno I woke up a feelin' mean went down to play the slot machine the wheels turned round, and the letters read "Better head back to Tennessee Jed" -- Grateful Dead Post no bills. A new 'chutist had just jumped from the plane at 10,000 feet, and soon discovered that all his lines were hopelessly tangled. At about 5,000 feet, still struggling, he noticed someone coming up from the ground at about the same speed as he was going towards the ground. As they passed each other at 3,000 feet, the 'chutist yells, "HEY! DO YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT PARACHUTES?" The reply came, fading towards the end, "NO! DO YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT COLEMAN STOVES?" 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. By arranging all this free publicity for the net, you'll become very well known. People on the net will wait in eager anticipation for your every posting, and refer to you constantly. You'll get more mail than you ever dreamed possible -- the ultimate in net success. -- Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette ... My pants just went on a wild rampage through a Long Island Bowling Alley!! "I prefer to think that God is not dead, just drunk" -- John Huston A woman may very well form a friendship with a man, but for this to endure, it must be assisted by a little physical antipathy. -- Nietzsche COMPASS [for the CDC-6000 series] is the sort of assembler one expects from a corporation whose president codes in octal. -- J. N. Gray Kiss your keyboard goodbye! Williams and Holland's Law: If enough data is collected, anything may be proven by statistical methods. QF is going to get zipfile support today heh... infozip? If I'm lucky yes knghtbrd: You're kidding, right? ;) * Deek takes away Knghtbrd's crack pipe. ;) The star of riches is shining upon you. You will reach the highest possible point in your business or profession. Knebel's Law: It is now proved beyond doubt that smoking is one of the leading causes of statistics. philosophy: The ability to bear with calmness the misfortunes of our friends. Swipple's Rule of Order: He who shouts the loudest has the floor. Not all who own a harp are harpers. -- Marcus Terentius Varro Nothing is finished until the paperwork is done. "The clergy successfully preached the doctrines of patience and pusillanimity; the active virtues of society were discouraged; and the last remains of a military spirit were buried in the cloister: a large portion of public and private wealth was consecrated to the specious demands of charity and devotion; and the soldiers' pay was lavished on the useless multitudes of both sexes who could only plead the merits of abstinence and chastity." -- Edward Gibbons, _The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_ Humor in the Court: Q. Were you aquainted with the deceased? A. Yes, sir. Q. Before or after he died? Due to lack of disk space, this fortune database has been discontinued. "If truth is beauty, how come no one has their hair done in the library?" -- Lily Tomlin write-protect tab, n.: A small sticker created to cover the unsightly notch carelessly left by disk manufacturers. The use of the tab creates an error message once in a while, but its aesthetic value far outweighs the momentary inconvenience. -- Robb Russon Mr. Cole's Axiom: The sum of the intelligence on the planet is a constant; the population is growing. paycheck: The weekly $5.27 that remains after deductions for federal withholding, state withholding, city withholding, FICA, medical/dental, long-term disability, unemployment insurance, Christmas Club, and payroll savings plan contributions. Due to circumstances beyond your control, you are master of your fate and captain of your soul. You can never tell which way the train went by looking at the tracks. Tact, n.: The unsaid part of what you're thinking. One is not superior merely because one sees the world as odious. -- Chateaubriand (1768-1848) ----==-- _ / / \ ---==---(_)__ __ ____ __ / / /\ \ --==---/ / _ \/ // /\ \/ / / /_/\ \ \ -=====/_/_//_/\_,_/ /_/\_\ /______\ \ \ A proud member of TeamLinux \_________\/ -- CHaley (HAC), haley@unm.edu, ch008cth@pi.lanl.gov) Ever feel like life was a game and you had the wrong instruction book? I don't like this official/unofficial distinction. It sound, er, officious. -- Larry Wall in <199702221943.LAA20388@wall.org> QOTD: "If I'm what I eat, I'm a chocolate chip cookie." Still a few bugs in the system... Someday I have to tell you about Uncle Nahum from Maine, who spent years trying to cross a jellyfish with a shad so he could breed boneless shad. His experiment backfired too, and he wound up with bony jellyfish... which was hardly worth the trouble. There's very little call for those up there. -- Allucquere R. "Sandy" Stone c++: the power, elegance and simplicity of a hand grenade If all else fails, lower your standards. On ability: A dwarf is small, even if he stands on a mountain top; a colossus keeps his height, even if he stands in a well. -- Lucius Annaeus Seneca, 4BC - 65AD Either I'm dead or my watch has stopped. -- Groucho Marx's last words Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted. Peace be to this house, and all that dwell in it. There are bugs and then there are bugs. And then there are bugs. -- Karl Lehenbauer "I'd love to go out with you, but I'm attending the opening of my garage door." "My country, right or wrong" is a thing that no patriot would think of saying, except in a desperate case. It is like saying "My mother, drunk or sober." -- G. K. Chesterton, "The Defendant" Sattinger's Law: It works better if you plug it in. "Compulsory unification of opinion achieves only the unanimity of the graveyard." -- Justice Jackson, writing for the majority, in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette 319 U.S. 624 No. 591 There are three things men can do with women: love them, suffer for them, or turn them into literature. -- Stephen Stills It's simply unbelievable how much energy and creativity people have invested into creating contradictory, bogus and stupid licenses... -- - Sven Rudolph about licences in debian/non-free. gurmlish, n.: The red warning flag at the top of a club sandwich which prevents the person from biting into it and puncturing the roof of his mouth. -- Rich Hall, "Sniglets" The Preacher, the Politician, the Teacher, Were each of them once a kiddie. A child, indeed, is a wonderful creature. Do I want one? God Forbiddie! -- Ogden Nash FORTRAN is a good example of a language which is easier to parse using ad hoc techniques. -- D. Gries [What's good about it? Ed.] Never let someone who says it cannot be done interrupt the person who is doing it. The Great Bald Swamp Hedgehog: The Great Bald Swamp Hedgehog of Billericay displays, in courtship, his single prickle and does impressions of Holiday Inn desk clerks. Since this means him standing motionless for enormous periods of time he is often eaten in full display by The Great Bald Swamp Hedgehog Eater. -- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac" Fishing, with me, has always been an excuse to drink in the daytime. -- Jimmy Cannon panic: kernel segmentation violation. core dumped (only kidding) Old Tom Bombadil is a merry fellow, Bright blue his jacket is, and his boots are yellow. None has ever caught him yet, for Tom, he is the master: His songs are stronger songs, and his feet are faster. -- J. R. R. Tolkien Life is like a 10 speed bicycle. Most of us have gears we never use. -- C. Schultz People respond to people who respond. "Flattery is all right -- if you don't inhale." -- Adlai Stevenson Once you've seen one nuclear war, you've seen them all. Never appeal to a man's "better nature." He may not have one. Invoking his self-interest gives you more leverage. -- Lazarus Long I am having FUN... I wonder if it's NET FUN or GROSS FUN? "As an adolescent I aspired to lasting fame, I craved factual certainty, and I thirsted for a meaningful vision of human life -- so I became a scientist. This is like becoming an archbishop so you can meet girls." -- Matt Cartmill You will have a head crash on your private pack. I have also been a huge Unix fan ever since I realized that SCO was not Unix. -- Dennis Baker Death is Nature's way of recycling human beings. I want to be the white man's brother, not his brother-in-law. -- Martin Luther King, Jr. Real programs don't eat cache. The Worst Jury A murder trial at Manitoba in February 1978 was well advanced, when one juror revealed that he was completely deaf and did not have the remotest clue what was happening. The judge, Mr. Justice Solomon, asked him if he had heard any evidence at all and, when there was no reply, dismissed him. The excitement which this caused was only equalled when a second juror revealed that he spoke not a word of English. A fluent French speaker, he exhibited great surprised when told, after two days, that he was hearing a murder trial. The trial was abandoned when a third juror said that he suffered from both conditions, being simultaneously unversed in the English language and nearly as deaf as the first juror. The judge ordered a retrial. -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures" Penn's aunts made great apple pies at low prices. No one else in town could compete with the pie rates of Penn's aunts. Trust your husband, adore your husband, and get as much as you can in your own name. -- Joan Rivers panic: can't find / My favorite sandwich is peanut butter, baloney, cheddar cheese, lettuce and mayonnaise on toasted bread with catsup on the side. -- Senator Hubert Humphrey "A commercial, and in some respects a social, doubt has been started within the last year or two, whether or not it is right to discuss so openly the security or insecurity of locks. Many well-meaning persons suppose that the discus- sion respecting the means for baffling the supposed safety of locks offers a premium for dishonesty, by showing others how to be dishonest. This is a fal- lacy. Rogues are very keen in their profession, and already know much more than we can teach them respecting their several kinds of roguery. Rogues knew a good deal about lockpicking long before locksmiths discussed it among them- selves, as they have lately done. If a lock -- let it have been made in what- ever country, or by whatever maker -- is not so inviolable as it has hitherto been deemed to be, surely it is in the interest of *honest* persons to know this fact, because the *dishonest* are tolerably certain to be the first to apply the knowledge practically; and the spread of knowledge is necessary to give fair play to those who might suffer by ignorance. It cannot be too ear- nestly urged, that an acquaintance with real facts will, in the end, be better for all parties." -- Charles Tomlinson's Rudimentary Treatise on the Construction of Locks, published around 1850 When there is an old maid in the house, a watch dog is unnecessary. -- Balzac It's grad exam time... COMPUTER SCIENCE Inside your desk you'll find a listing of the DEC/VMS operating system in IBM 1710 machine code. Show what changes are necessary to convert this code into a UNIX Berkeley 7 operating system. Prove that these fixes are bug free and run correctly. You should gain at least 150% efficiency in the new system. (You should take no more than 10 minutes on this question.) MATHEMATICS If X equals PI times R^2, construct a formula showing how long it would take a fire ant to drill a hole through a dill pickle, if the length-girth ratio of the ant to the pickle were 98.17:1. GENERAL KNOWLEDGE Describe the Universe. Give three examples. Every program has (at least) two purposes: the one for which it was written and another for which it wasn't. "Wish not to seem, but to be, the best." -- Aeschylus Perl has a long tradition of working around compilers. -- Larry Wall in <199708252256.PAA00105@wall.org> Nice guys finish last, but we get to sleep in. -- Evan Davis It is wrong always, everywhere and for everyone to believe anything upon insufficient evidence. -- W. K. Clifford, British philosopher, circa 1876 Marriage is a ghastly public confession of a strictly private intention. Must be under 48 inches in height. The Worst Prison Guards The largest number of convicts ever to escape simultaneously from a maximum security prison is 124. This record is held by Alcoente Prison, near Lisbon in Portugal. During the weeks leading up to the escape in July 1978 the prison warders had noticed that attendances had fallen at film shows which included "The Great Escape", and also that 220 knives and a huge quantity of electric cable had disappeared. A guard explained, "Yes, we were planning to look for them, but never got around to it." The warders had not, however, noticed the gaping holes in the wall because they were "covered with posters". Nor did they detect any of the spades, chisels, water hoses and electric drills amassed by the inmates in large quantities. The night before the breakout one guard had noticed that of the 36 prisoners in his block only 13 were present. He said this was "normal" because inmates sometimes missed roll-call or hid, but usually came back the next morning. "We only found out about the escape at 6:30 the next morning when one of the prisoners told us," a warder said later. [...] When they eventually checked, the prison guards found that exactly half of the gaol's population was missing. By way of explanation the Justice Minister, Dr. Santos Pais, claimed that the escape was "normal" and part of the "legitimate desire of the prisoner to regain his liberty." -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures" I like the seed code for computing masking curves. I've never seen code that made be want to drink before that... On ability: A dwarf is small, even if he stands on a mountain top; a colossus keeps his height, even if he stands in a well. -- Lucius Annaeus Seneca, 4BC - 65AD There are twenty-five people left in the world, and twenty-seven of them are hamburgers. -- Ed Sanders There is a vast difference between the savage and civilized man, but it is never apparent to their wives until after breakfast. -- Helen Rowland we: The single most important word in the world. "You know, we've won awards for this crap." -- David Letterman ... Any resemblance between the above views and those of my employer, my terminal, or the view out my window are purely coincidental. Any resemblance between the above and my own views is non-deterministic. The question of the existence of views in the absence of anyone to hold them is left as an exercise for the reader. The question of the existence of the reader is left as an exercise for the second god coefficient. (A discussion of non-orthogonal, non-integral polytheism is beyond the scope of this article.) Flinny: black crontab magic kinda stuff :) Joy: does that mean people get to dance naked around bonfires chanting strange things and waving their arms about in a silly manner? knghtbrd: what do you *think* people do at novare? Beneath this stone lies Murphy, They buried him today, He lived the life of Riley, While Riley was away. Sometimes you get an almost irresistible urge to go on living. We are using Linux daily to UP our productivity - so UP yours! -- Adapted from Pat Paulsen by Joe Sloan Advertisements contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper. -- Thomas Jefferson Politics -- the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich by promising to protect each from the other. -- Oscar Ameringer /* * Oops. The kernel tried to access some bad page. We'll have to * terminate things with extreme prejudice. */ die_if_kernel("Oops", regs, error_code); -- From linux/arch/i386/mm/fault.c "Catch a wave and you're sitting on top of the world." -- The Beach Boys Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do. Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do. -- Mark Twain love, v.: I'll let you play with my life if you'll let me play with yours. but one sort per tab and none per list is arguably better than O(n + n**2) per tab and O(n**2) per list. OMG, someone shoot me. ? I can't believe I just used the big goose-egg to explain why my way is probably best in the long run. "Triumph without Victory, The Unreported History of the Persian Gulf War", -Headline published in the U.S. News & World Report, 1992. Plumbing is one of the easier of do-it-yourself activities, requiring only a few simple tools and a willingness to stick your arm into a clogged toilet. In fact, you can solve many home plumbing problems, such as annoying faucet drip, merely by turning up the radio. But before we get into specific techniques, let's look at how plumbing works. A plumbing system is very much like your electrical system, except that instead of electricity, it has water, and instead of wires, it has pipes, and instead of radios and waffle irons, it has faucets and toilets. So the truth is that your plumbing systems is nothing at all like your electrical system, which is good, because electricity can kill you. -- Dave Barry, "The Taming of the Screw" Don't vote -- it only encourages them! A MODERN FABLE Aesop's fables and other traditional children's stories involve allegory far too subtle for the youth of today. Children need an updated message with contemporary circumstance and plot line, and short enough to suit today's minute attention span. The Troubled Aardvark Once upon a time, there was an aardvark whose only pleasure in life was driving from his suburban bungalow to his job at a large brokerage house in his brand new 4x4. He hated his manipulative boss, his conniving and unethical co-workers, his greedy wife, and his snivelling, spoiled children. One day, the aardvark reflected on the meaning of his life and his career and on the unchecked, catastrophic decline of his nation, its pathetic excuse for leadership, and the complete ineffectiveness of any personal effort he could make to change the status quo. Overcome by a wave of utter depression and self-doubt, he decided to take the only course of action that would bring him greater comfort and happiness: he drove to the mall and bought imported consumer electronics goods. MORAL OF THE STORY: Invest in foreign consumer electronics manufacturers. -- Tom Annau "... being a Linux user is sort of like living in a house inhabited by a large family of carpenters and architects. Every morning when you wake up, the house is a little different. Maybe there is a new turret, or some walls have moved. Or perhaps someone has temporarily removed the floor under your bed." - Unix for Dummies, 2nd Edition -- found in the .sig of Rob Riggs, rriggs@tesser.com Sauron is alive in Argentina! For fast-acting relief, try slowing down. I think $[ is more like a coelacanth than a mastadon. -- Larry Wall in <199705101952.MAA00756@wall.org> This sentence contradicts itself -- no actually it doesn't. -- Douglas Hofstadter !seen god LauraDax, I don't remember seeing "god" I like myself, but I won't say I'm as handsome as the bull that kidnapped Europa. -- Marcus Tullius Cicero RMS for President??? ...or ESR, he wants a new job ;) I request a weekend in Havana with Phil Silvers! Life is full of concepts that are poorly defined. In fact, there are very few concepts that aren't. It's hard to think of any in non-technical fields. -- Daniel Kimberg FORTUNE'S RULES TO LIVE BY: #23 Don't cut off a police car when making an illegal U-turn. When in doubt, do it. It's much easier to apologize than to get permission. -- Grace Murray Hopper Behind all the political rhetoric being hurled at us from abroad, we are bringing home one unassailable fact -- [terrorism is] a crime by any civilized standard, committed against innocent people, away from the scene of political conflict, and must be dealt with as a crime. . . . [I]n our recognition of the nature of terrorism as a crime lies our best hope of dealing with it. . . . [L]et us use the tools that we have. Let us invoke the cooperation we have the right to expect around the world, and with that cooperation let us shrink the dark and dank areas of sanctuary until these cowardly marauders are held to answer as criminals in an open and public trial for the crimes they have committed, and receive the punishment they so richly deserve. -- William H. Webster, Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation, 15 Oct 1985 This fortune is false. You tell it that it's indicative by appending $!. That's why we made $! such a short variable name, after all. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199709081801.LAA20629@wall.org> Minicomputer: A computer that can be afforded on the budget of a middle-level manager. Real software engineers don't debug programs, they verify correctness. This process doesn't necessarily involve execution of anything on a computer, except perhaps a Correctness Verification Aid package. Thinks't thou existence doth depend on time? It doth; but actions are our epochs; mine Have made my days and nights imperishable, Endless, and all alike, as sands on the shore, Innumerable atoms; and one desert, Barren and cold, on which the wild waves break, But nothing rests, save carcasses and wrecks, Rocks, and the salt-surf weeds of bitterness. How long a minute is depends on which side of the bathroom door you're on. A rolling stone gathers no moss. -- Publilius Syrus The surest protection against temptation is cowardice. -- Mark Twain If it is a Miracle, any sort of evidence will answer, but if it is a Fact, proof is necessary. -- Samuel Clemens We are MicroSoft. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. -- Attributed to B.G., Gill Bates It has long been an article of our folklore that too much knowledge or skill, or especially consummate expertise, is a bad thing. It dehumanizes those who achieve it, and makes difficult their commerce with just plain folks, in whom good old common sense has not been obliterated by mere book learning or fancy notions. This popular delusion flourishes now more than ever, for we are all infected with it in the schools, where educationists have elevated it from folklore to Article of Belief. It enhances their self-esteem and lightens their labors by providing theoretical justification for deciding that appreciation, or even simple awareness, is more to be prized than knowledge, and relating (to self and others), more than skill, in which minimum competence will be quite enough. -- The Underground Grammarian Don't get mad, get even. -- Joseph P. Kennedy Don't get even, get jewelry. -- Anonymous 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. Actually, my goal is to have a sandwich named after me. Are we running light with overbyte? "Love is an ideal thing, marriage a real thing; a confusion of the real with the ideal never goes unpunished." -- Goethe Never buy what you do not want because it is cheap; it will be dear to you. -- Thomas Jefferson The real trouble with reality is that there's no background music. Has anyone realized that the purpose of the fortune cookie program is to defuse project tensions? When did you ever see a cheerful cookie, a non-cynical, or even an informative cookie? Perhaps inadvertently, we have a channel for our aggressions. This still begs the question of whether the cookie releases the pressure or only serves to blunt the warning signs. Long live the revolution! Have a nice day. All international orders must be accompanied by payment in U. S. funds. Rube Walker: "Hey, Yogi, what time is it?" Yogi Berra: "You mean now?" "It doesn't much signify whom one marries for one is sure to find out next morning it was someone else." -- Rogers The government has just completed work on a missile that turned out to be a bit of a boondoggle; nicknamed "Civil Servant", it won't work and they can't fire it. When in doubt, tell the truth. -- Mark Twain FORTUNE PROVIDES QUESTIONS FOR THE GREAT ANSWERS: #31 A: Chicken Teriyaki. Q: What is the name of the world's oldest kamikaze pilot? The King and his advisor are overlooking the battle field: King: "How goes the battle plan?" Advisor: "See those little black specks running to the right?" K: "Yes." A: "Those are their guys. And all those little red specks running to the left are our guys. Then when they collide we wait till the dust clears." K: "And?" A: "If there are more red specks left than black specks, we win." K: "But what about the ^#!!$% battle plan?" A: "So far, it seems to be going according to specks." I just got out of the hospital after a speed reading accident. I hit a bookmark. -- Steven Wright Top Ten Things Overheard At The ANSI C Draft Committee Meetings: (10) Sorry, but that's too useful. (9) Dammit, little-endian systems *are* more consistent! (8) I'm on the committee and I *still* don't know what the hell #pragma is for. (7) Well, it's an excellent idea, but it would make the compilers too hard to write. (6) Them bats is smart; they use radar. (5) All right, who's the wiseguy who stuck this trigraph stuff in here? (4) How many times do we have to tell you, "No prior art!" (3) Ha, ha, I can't believe they're actually going to adopt this sucker. (2) Thank you for your generous donation, Mr. Wirth. (1) Gee, I wish we hadn't backed down on 'noalias'. If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed. -- Albert Einstein The little girl expects no declaration of tenderness from her doll. She loves it -- and that's all. It is thus that we should love. -- DeGourmont Heisenberg may have slept here... When Marriage is Outlawed, Only Outlaws will have Inlaws. "Danger, you haven't seen the last of me!" "No, but the first of you turns my stomach!" -- The Firesign Theatre's Nick Danger This Fortune Examined By INSPECTOR NO. 2-14 Lowery's Law: If it jams -- force it. If it breaks, it needed replacing anyway. How many NASA managers does it take to screw in a lightbulb? "That's a known problem... don't worry about it." Cops never say good-bye. They're always hoping to see you again in the line-up. -- Raymond Chandler The giraffe you thought you offended last week is willing to be nuzzled today. In which level of metalanguage are you now speaking? Machine Always Crashes, If Not, The Operating System Hangs (MACINTOSH) -- Topic on #Linux It's not reality or how you perceive things that's important -- it's what you're taking for it... "Confound these ancestors.... They've stolen our best ideas!" -- Ben Jonson Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra, which suddenly flips over, pinning you underneath. At night the ice weasels come. -- Matt Groening, "Love is Hell" Human beings were created by water to transport it uphill. The only "ism" Hollywood believes in is plagiarism. -- Dorothy Parker There's no honorable way to kill, no gentle way to destroy. There is nothing good in war. Except its ending. -- Abraham Lincoln, "The Savage Curtain", stardate 5906.5 Proposed Country & Western Song Titles I Don't Mind If You Lie to Me, As Long As I Ain't Lyin' Alone I Wouldn't Take You to a Dog Fight Even If I Thought You Could Win If You Leave Me, Walk Out Backwards So I'll Think You're Comin' In Since You Learned to Lip-Sync, I'm At Your Disposal My John Deere Was Breaking Your Field, While Your Dear John Was Breaking My Heart Don't Cry, Little Darlin', You're Waterin' My Beer Tennis Must Be Your Racket, 'Cause Love Means Nothin' to You When You Say You Love Me, You're Full of Prunes, 'Cause Living With You Is the Pits I Wanted Your Hand in Marriage but All I Got Was the Finger -- "Wordplay" I read the newspaper avidly. It is my one form of continuous fiction. -- Aneurin Bevan Bolub's Fourth Law of Computerdom: Project teams detest weekly progress reporting because it so vividly manifests their lack of progress. Intellect annuls Fate. So far as a man thinks, he is free. -- Ralph Waldo Emerson Go placidly amid the noise and waste, and remember what value there may be in owning a piece thereof. -- National Lampoon, "Deteriorata" Symptom: Floor swaying. Fault: Excessive air turbulence, perhaps due to air-hockey game in progress. Action Required: Insert broom handle down back of jacket. Symptom: Everything has gone dim, strange taste of peanuts and pretzels or cigarette butts in mouth. Fault: You have fallen forward. Action Required: See above. Symptom: Opposite wall covered with acoustic tile and several flourescent light strips. Fault: You have fallen over backward. Action Required: If your glass is full and no one is standing on your drinking arm, stay put. If not, get someone to help you get up, lash yourself to bar. -- Bar Troubleshooting statistics, n.: A system for expressing your political prejudices in convincing scientific guise. Someday, Weederman, we'll look back on all this and laugh... It will probably be one of those deep, eerie ones that slowly builds to a blood-curdling maniacal scream... but still it will be a laugh. -- Mister Boffo Linux supports the notion of a command line or a shell for the same reason that only children read books with only pictures in them. Language, be it English or something else, is the only tool flexible enough to accomplish a sufficiently broad range of tasks. -- Bill Garrett Do what you can to prolong your life, in the hope that someday you'll learn what it's for. Your mode of life will be changed for the better because of good news soon. Did it ever occur to you that fat chance and slim chance mean the same thing? Or that we drive on parkways and park on driveways? Basic is a high level languish. APL is a high level anguish. "I have a bone to pick, and a few to break." -- Anonymous * Mercury calmly removes XT-Ream's arm.. * Mercury then proceeds to beat XT-Ream with XT-Ream's arm. wow, all this quake hacking is making Mercury violent here * mao is glad the quake forge project is in good hands Responsibility: Everyone says that having power is a great responsibility. This is a lot of bunk. Responsibility is when someone can blame you if something goes wrong. When you have power you are surrounded by people whose job it is to take the blame for your mistakes. If they're smart, that is. -- Cerebus, "On Governing" Advertisements contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper. -- Thomas Jefferson Wake up all you citizens, hear your country's call, Not to arms and violence, But peace for one and all. Crush out hate and prejudice, fear and greed and sin, Help bring back her dignity, restore her faith again. Work hard for a common cause, don't let our country fall. Make her proud and strong again, democracy for all. Yes, make our country strong again, keep our flag unfurled. Make our country well again, respected by the world. Make her whole and beautiful, work from sun to sun. Stand tall and labor side by side, because there's so much to be done. Yes, make her whole and beautiful, united strong and free, Wake up, all you citizens, It's up to you and me. -- Pansy Myers Schroeder A shapely CATHOLIC SCHOOLGIRL is FIDGETING inside my costume.. Hedonist for hire... no job too easy! If you try to please everyone, somebody is not going to like it. 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" Tobacco is a filthy weed, That from the devil does proceed; It drains your purse, it burns your clothes, And makes a chimney of your nose. -- B. Waterhouse Just because your doctor has a name for your condition doesn't mean he knows what it is. Anybody with money to burn will easily find someone to tend the fire. "What's the use of a good quotation if you can't change it?" -- The Doctor "In the face of entropy and nothingness, you kind of have to pretend it's not there if you want to keep writing good code." -- Karl Lehenbauer Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it. -- Gandhi Mike's Law: For a lumber company employing two men and a cut-off saw, the marginal product of labor for any number of additional workers equals zero until the acquisition of another cut-off saw. Let's not even consider a chainsaw. - Mike Dennison [You could always schedule the saw, though - ed.] Been Transferred Lately? There are three things I have always loved and never understood -- art, music, and women. Police: Good evening, are you the host? Host: No. Police: We've been getting complaints about this party. Host: About the drugs? Police: No. Host: About the guns, then? Is somebody complaining about the guns? Police: No, the noise. Host: Oh, the noise. Well that makes sense because there are no guns or drugs here. (An enormous explosion is heard in the background.) Or fireworks. Who's complaining about the noise? The neighbors? Police: No, the neighbors fled inland hours ago. Most of the recent complaints have come from Pittsburgh. Do you think you could ask the host to quiet things down? Host: No Problem. (At this point, a Volkswagon bug with primitive religious symbols drawn on the doors emerges from the living room and roars down the hall, past the police and onto the lawn, where it smashes into a tree. Eight guests tumble out onto the grass, moaning.) See? Things are starting to wind down. AIX - the Unix from the universe where Spock has a beard. I'm always looking for a new idea that will be more productive than its cost. -- David Rockefeller Hey, waiter! I want a NEW SHIRT and a PONY TAIL with lemon sauce! It is wrong always, everywhere and for everyone to believe anything upon insufficient evidence. -- W. K. Clifford, British philosopher, circa 1876 The one day you'd sell your soul for something, souls are a glut. Laugh and the world laughs with you, snore and you sleep alone. Are we going to make an emacs out of apt? APT - Debian in a program. It even does your laundry -- Seen on #Debian Nothing is so firmly believed as that which we least know. -- Michel de Montaigne The truth of a proposition has nothing to do with its credibility. And vice versa. "Your stupidity, Allen, is simply not up to par." -- Dave Mack (mack@inco.UUCP) "Yours is." -- Allen Gwinn (allen@sulaco.sigma.com), in alt.flame I'd like to meet the guy who invented beer and see what he's working on now. MS-DOS, you can't live with it, you can live without it. -- from Lars Wirzenius' .sig I got tired of listening to the recording on the phone at the movie theater. So I bought the album. I got kicked out of a theater the other day for bringing my own food in. I argued that the concession stand prices were outrageous. Besides, I hadn't had a barbecue in a long time. I went to the theater and the sign said adults $5 children $2.50. I told them I wanted 2 boys and a girl. I once took a cab to a drive-in movie. The movie cost me $95. -- Steven Wright 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. Life is a yo-yo, and mankind ties knots in the string. Hello. Just walk along and try NOT to think about your INTESTINES being almost FORTY YARDS LONG!! [Maturity consists in the discovery that] there comes a critical moment where everything is reversed, after which the point becomes to understand more and more that there is something which cannot be understood. -- S. Kierkegaard I think I'm schizophrenic. One half of me's paranoid and the other half's out to get him. Someday somebody has got to decide whether the typewriter is the machine, or the person who operates it. A little inaccuracy saves a world of explanation. -- C. E. Ayres Whenever people agree with me, I always think I must be wrong. -- Oscar Wilde * Knghtktty whispers sweet nothings to Thyla (stuff about compilers and graphics and ram upgrades and big hard drives...) oooooooooOOOOOOOOOO Knghtktty: that's positively pornographic... * Thyla goes off into fits of ecstasy... Sometimes I get the feeling that there are orgies going on all over New York City, and somebody says, "Let's call Desmond," and somebody else says, "Why bother? He's probably home reading the Encyclopedia Britannica." -- Paul Desmond, jazz saxophonist 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 The game of life is a game of boomerangs. Our thoughts, deeds and words return to us sooner or later with astounding accuracy. What's all this brouhaha? If I don't drive around the park, I'm pretty sure to make my mark. If I'm in bed each night by ten, I may get back my looks again. If I abstain from fun and such, I'll probably amount to much; But I shall stay the way I am, Because I do not give a damn. -- Dorothy Parker While you recently had your problems on the run, they've regrouped and are making another attack. If you want to be ruined, marry a rich woman. -- Michelet Jones' First Law: Anyone who makes a significant contribution to any field of endeavor, and stays in that field long enough, becomes an obstruction to its progress -- in direct proportion to the importance of their original contribution. Research is to see what everybody else has seen, and think what nobody else has thought. Fortune and love befriend the bold. -- Ovid I want a VEGETARIAN BURRITO to go ... with EXTRA MSG!! "Just out of curiosity does this actually mean something or have some of the few remaining bits of your brain just evaporated?" -- Patricia O Tuama, rissa@killer.DALLAS.TX.US "I honestly believe that the doctrine of hell was born in the glittering eyes of snakes that run in frightful coils watching for their prey. I believe it was born with the yelping, howling, growling and snarling of wild beasts... I despise it, I defy it, and I hate it." -- Robert G. Ingersoll People disagree with me. I just ignore them. -- Linus Torvalds, regarding the use of C++ for the Linux kernel "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." -- George Bernard Shaw Compassion Compassion is the finest weapon and best defence. If you would establish harmony, Compassion must surround you like a fortress. Therefore, A good soldier does not inspire fear; A good fighter does not display aggression; A good conqueror does not engage in battle; A good leader does not exercise authority. This is the value of unimportance; This is how to win the cooperation of others; This to how to build the same harmony that is in nature. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" alexsh: Be /VERY/ cairful, you could, if your unlucky, fry your motherboards.. Mercury - sounds like fun Television has brought back murder into the home -- where it belongs. -- Alfred Hitchcock God is real, unless declared integer. The more a man is imbued with the ordered regularity of all events, the firmer becomes his conviction that there is no room left by the side of this ordered regularity for causes of a different nature. For him neither the rule of human nor the rule of divine will exists as an independent cause of natural events. To be sure, the doctrine of a personal God interfering with natural events could never be refuted, in the real sense, by science, for this doctrine can always take refuge in those domains in which scientific knowledge has not yet been able to set foot. But I am persuaded that such behavior on the part of the representatives of religion would not only be unworthy but also fatal. For a doctrine which is able to maintain itself not in clear light, but only in the dark, will of necessity lose its effect on mankind, with incalculable harm to human progress. In their struggle for the ethical good, teachers of religion must have the stature to give up the doctrine of a personal God, that is, give up that source of fear and hope which in the past placed such vast powers in the hands of priests. In their labors they will have to avail themselves of those forces which are capable of cultivating the Good, the True, and the Beautiful in humanity itself. This is, to be sure, a more difficult but an incomparably more worthy task. -- Albert Einstein Stupid, n.: Losing $25 on the game and $25 on the instant replay. 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 "The human brain is like an enormous fish -- it is flat and slimy and has gills through which it can see." -- Monty Python A chronic disposition to inquiry deprives domestic felines of vital qualities. Everybody likes a kidder, but nobody lends him money. -- Arthur Miller It is the business of the future to be dangerous. -- Hawkwind FORTUNE'S FUN FACTS TO KNOW AND TELL: #44 Zebras are colored with dark stripes on a light background. No man in the world has more courage than the man who can stop after eating one peanut. -- Channing Pollock Five rules for eternal misery: (1) Always try to exhort others to look upon you favorably. (2) Make lots of assumptions about situations and be sure to treat these assumptions as though they are reality. (3) Then treat each new situation as though it's a crisis. (4) Live in the past and future only (become obsessed with how much better things might have been or how much worse things might become). (5) Occasionally stomp on yourself for being so stupid as to follow the first four rules. Conscience doth make cowards of us all. -- Shakespeare One big pile is better than two little piles. -- Arlo Guthrie "Necessity is the mother of invention" is a silly proverb. "Necessity is the mother of futile dodges" is much nearer the truth. -- Alfred North Whitehead Democracy is good. I say this because other systems are worse. -- Jawaharlal Nehru Happiness is having a scratch for every itch. -- Ogden Nash Power corrupts. Absolute power is kind of neat. -- John Lehman, Secretary of the Navy, 1981-1987 My experience with government is when things are non-controversial, beautifully co-ordinated and all the rest, it must be that not much is going on. -- J. F. Kennedy I used to be disgusted, now I find I'm just amused. -- Elvis Costello 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" "Of all the tyrannies that affect mankind, tyranny in religion is the worst." -- Thomas Paine Keep up the good work! But please don't ask me to help. PUNK ROCK!! DISCO DUCK!! BIRTH CONTROL!! Wasn't there something about a PASCAL programmer knowing the value of everything and the Wirth of nothing? QOTD: "I am not sure what this is, but an 'F' would only dignify it." A feed salesman is on his way to a farm. As he's driving along at forty m.p.h., he looks out his car window and sees a three-legged chicken running alongside him, keeping pace with his car. He is amazed that a chicken is running at forty m.p.h. So he speeds up to forty-five, fifty, then sixty m.p.h. The chicken keeps right up with him the whole way, then suddenly takes off and disappears into the distance. The man pulls into the farmyard and says to the farmer, "You know, the strangest thing just happened to me; I was driving along at at least sixty miles an hour and a chicken passed me like I was standing still!" "Yeah," the farmer replies, "that chicken was ours. You see, there's me, and there's Ma, and there's our son Billy. Whenever we had chicken for dinner, we would all want a drumstick, so we'd have to kill two chickens. So we decided to try and breed a three-legged chicken so each of us could have a drumstick." "How do they taste?" said the farmer. "Don't know," replied the farmer. "We haven't been able to catch one yet." I don't wish to appear overly inquisitive, but are you still alive? Hegel was right when he said that we learn from history that man can never learn anything from history. -George Bernard Shaw Everyone has a purpose in life. Perhaps yours is watching television. -- David Letterman You'd better smile when they watch you, smile like you're in control. -- Smile, "Was (Not Was)" People will buy anything that's one to a customer. This is now. Later is later. I just forgot my whole philosophy of life!!! Gratitude, like love, is never a dependable international emotion. -- Joseph Alsop A computer scientist is someone who fixes things that aren't broken. "Anyone can say 'no'. It is the first word a child learns and often the first word he speaks. It is a cheap word because it requires no explanation, and many men and women have acquired a reputation for intelligence who know only this word and have used it in place of thought on every occasion." -- Chuck Jones (Warner Bros. animation director.) I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behind. -- George Bernard Shaw Prejudice: A vagrant opinion without visible means of support. -- Ambrose Bierce Margaret, are you grieving Over Goldengrove unleaving? Leaves, like the things of man, You, with your fresh thoughts Care for, can you? Ah! as the heart grows older It will come to such sights colder By and by, nor spare a sigh Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie And yet you will weep and know why. Now no matter, child, the name Sorrow's springs are the same: It is the blight man was born for, It is Margaret you mourn for. -- Gerard Manley Hopkins. Phases of a Project: (1) Exultation. (2) Disenchantment. (3) Confusion. (4) Search for the Guilty. (5) Punishment for the Innocent. (6) Distinction for the Uninvolved. Drilling for oil is boring. Encyclopedia for sale by father. Son knows everything. It is clear that the individual who persecutes a man, his brother, because he is not of the same opinion, is a monster. -- Voltaire Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd. -- Voltaire Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they AREN'T after you. That's the funniest thing I've ever heard and I will _not_ condone it. -- DyerMaker, 17 March 2000 MegaPhone radio show Come, landlord, fill the flowing bowl until it does run over, Tonight we will all merry be -- tomorrow we'll get sober. -- John Fletcher, "The Bloody Brother", II, 2 Despite the best efforts of a quantum bigfoot drive (yes I know everyone told me they suck, now I know they were right) 2.1.109ac1 is now available -- Alan Cox announcing Linux 2.1.109ac1 Pig: An animal (Porcus omnivorous) closely allied to the human race by the splendor and vivacity of its appetite, which, however, is inferior in scope, for it balks at pig. -- Ambrose Bierce Humor in the Court: Q: Could you see him from where you were standing? A: I could see his head. Q: And where was his head? A: Just above his shoulders. Why not have an old-fashioned Christmas for your family this year? Just picture the scene in your living room on Christmas morning as your children open their old-fashioned presents. Your 11-year-old son: "What the heck is this?" You: "A spinning top! You spin it around, and then eventually it falls down. What fun! Ha, ha!" Son: "Is this a joke? Jason Thompson's parents got him a computer with two disk drives and 128 kilobytes of random-access memory, and I get this cretin TOP?" Your 8-year-old daughter: "You think that's bad? Look at this." You: "It's figgy pudding! What a treat!" Daughter: "It looks like goat barf." -- Dave Barry, "Simple, Homespun Gifts" If some people didn't tell you, you'd never know they'd been away on vacation. Once the toothpaste is out of the tube, it's hard to get it back in. -- H. R. Haldeman in a stunning new move I actually tested this upload You can do this in a number of ways. IBM chose to do all of them. Why do you find that funny? -- D. Taylor, Computer Science 350 No man's ambition has a right to stand in the way of performing a simple act of justice. -- John Altgeld NEW YORK-- Kraft Foods, Inc. announced today that its board of directors unanimously rejected the $11 billion takeover bid by Philip Morris and Co. A Kraft spokesman stated in a press conference that the offer was rejected because the $90-per-share bid did not reflect the true value of the company. Wall Street insiders, however, tell quite a different story. Apparently, the Kraft board of directors had all but signed the takeover agreement when they learned of Philip Morris' marketing plans for one of their major Middle East subsidiaries. To a person, the board voted to reject the bid when they discovered that the tobacco giant intended to reorganize Israeli Cheddar, Ltd., and name the new company Cheeses of Nazareth. "The jig's up, Elman." "Which jig?" -- Jeff Elman Proposed Country & Western Song Titles She Ain't Much to See, but She Looks Good Through the Bottom of a Glass If Fingerprints Showed Up On Skin, I Wonder Who's I'd Find On You I'm Ashamed to be Here, but Not Ashamed Enough to Leave It's Commode Huggin' Time In The Valley If You Want to Keep the Beer Real Cold, Put It Next to My Ex-wife's Heart If You Get the Feeling That I Don't Love You, Feel Again I'm Ashamed To Be Here, But Not Ashamed Enough To Leave It's the Bottle Against the Bible in the Battle For Daddy's Soul My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend, And I Sure Miss Him Don't Cut Any More Wood, Baby, 'Cause I'll Be Comin' Home With A Load I Loved Her Face, But I Left Her Behind For You Computers are not intelligent. They only think they are. What is the difference between a Turing machine and the modern computer? It's the same as that between Hillary's ascent of Everest and the establishment of a Hilton on its peak. Every path has its puddle. To be loved is very demoralizing. -- Katharine Hepburn Dead? No excuse for laying off work. Everybody but Sam had signed up for a new company pension plan that called for a small employee contribution. The company was paying all the rest. Unfortunately, 100% employee participation was needed; otherwise the plan was off. Sam's boss and his fellow workers pleaded and cajoled, but to no avail. Sam said the plan would never pay off. Finally the company president called Sam into his office. "Sam," he said, "here's a copy of the new pension plan and here's a pen. I want you to sign the papers. I'm sorry, but if you don't sign, you're fired. As of right now." Sam signed the papers immediately. "Now," said the president, "would you mind telling me why you couldn't have signed earlier?" "Well, sir," replied Sam, "nobody explained it to me quite so clearly before." An age is called Dark not because the light fails to shine, but because people refuse to see it. -- James Michener, "Space" Just yesterday morning, they let me know you were gone, Suzanne, the plans they made put an end to you, I went out this morning and I wrote down this song, Just can't remember who to send it to... Oh, I've seen fire and I've seen rain, I've seen sunny days that I thought would never end, I've seen lonely times when I could not find a friend, But I always thought that I'd see you again. Thought I'd see you one more time again. -- James Taylor, "Fire and Rain" "... gentlemen do not read each other's mail." -- Secretary of State Henry Stimson, on closing down the Black Chamber, the precursor to the National Security Agency. He who lives without folly is less wise than he believes. For a young man, not yet: for an old man, never at all. -- Diogenes, asked when a man should marry When should a man marry? A young man, not yet; an elder man, not at all. -- Sir Francis Bacon, "Of Marriage and Single Life" First love is only a little foolishness and a lot of curiosity, no really self-respecting woman would take advantage of it. -- George Bernard Shaw, "John Bull's Other Island" Welcome to UNIX! Enjoy your session! Have a great time! Note the use of exclamation points! They are a very effective method for demonstrating excitement, and can also spice up an otherwise plain-looking sentence! However, there are drawbacks! Too much unnecessary exclaiming can lead to a reduction in the effect that an exclamation point has on the reader! For example, the sentence Jane went to the store to buy bread should only be ended with an exclamation point if there is something sensational about her going to the store, for example, if Jane is a cocker spaniel or if Jane is on a diet that doesn't allow bread or if Jane doesn't exist for some reason! See how easy it is?! Proper control of exclamation points can add new meaning to your life! Call now to receive my free pamphlet, "The Wonder and Mystery of the Exclamation Point!"! Enclose fifteen(!) dollars for postage and handling! Operators are standing by! (Which is pretty amazing, because they're all cocker spaniels!) He who knows nothing, knows nothing. But he who knows he knows nothing knows something. And he who knows someone whose friend's wife's brother knows nothing, he knows something. Or something like that. r0bert: in short, we're moving several things the client currently is responsible for telling the server into things the server checks for itself If Neo says "There is no spoon", The Matrix will say "Oh yes there is---no cheating!" But he knows kung fu... Sure he does, but I have a rocket launcher. Dismissed. That's a Star Fleet expression for, "Get out." -- Capt. Kathryn Janeway, Star Trek: Voyager, "The Cloud" You have the capacity to learn from mistakes. You'll learn a lot today. Support your right to bare arms! -- A message from the National Short-Sleeved Shirt Association And now for something completely the same. economics, n.: Economics is the study of the value and meaning of J. K. Galbraith. -- Mike Harding, "The Armchair Anarchist's Almanac" 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 Confucius say too much. -- Recent Chinese Proverb You look like a million dollars. All green and wrinkled. Green's Law of Debate: Anything is possible if you don't know what you're talking about. When you find yourself in danger, When you're threatened by a stranger, When it looks like you will take a lickin'... There is one thing you should learn, When there is no one else to turn to, Caaaall for Super Chicken!! (**bwuck-bwuck-bwuck-bwuck**) Caaaall for Super Chicken!! "Wrong," said Renner. "The tactful way," Rod said quietly, "the polite way to disagree with the Senator would be to say, `That turns out not to be the case.'" "Anyone attempting to generate random numbers by deterministic means is, of course, living in a state of sin." -- John Von Neumann Reliable source, n.: The guy you just met. "Waving away a cloud of smoke, I look up, and am blinded by a bright, white light. It's God. No, not Richard Stallman, or Linus Torvalds, but God. In a booming voice, He says: "THIS IS A SIGN. USE LINUX, THE FREE UNIX SYSTEM FOR THE 386." (Matt Welsh) As with most fine things, chocolate has its season. There is a simple memory aid that you can use to determine whether it is the correct time to order chocolate dishes: any month whose name contains the letter A, E, or U is the proper time for chocolate. -- Sandra Boynton, "Chocolate: The Consuming Passion" A woman can look both moral and exciting -- if she also looks as if it were quite a struggle. -- Edna Ferber "Anything created must necessarily be inferior to the essence of the creator." -- Claude Shouse "Einstein's mother must have been one heck of a physicist." -- Joseph C. Wang You humans have that emotional need to express gratitude. "You're welcome," I believe, is the correct response. -- Spock, "Bread and Circuses", stardate 4041.2 echo $package has manual pages available in source form. echo "However, you don't have nroff, so they're probably useless to you." -- Larry Wall in Configure from the perl distribution A celebrity is a person who is known for his well-knownness. Delay not, Caesar. Read it instantly. -- Shakespeare, "Julius Caesar" 3,1 Here is a letter, read it at your leisure. -- Shakespeare, "Merchant of Venice" 5,1 [Quoted in "VMS Internals and Data Structures", V4.4, when referring to I/O system services.] Tom's hungry, time to eat lunch. Van Roy's Law: An unbreakable toy is useful for breaking other toys. It's the Magic that counts. -- Larry Wall on Perl's apparent ugliness Wedding, n: A ceremony at which two persons undertake to become one, one undertakes to become nothing and nothing undertakes to become supportable. -- Ambrose Bierce On Thanksgiving Day all over America, families sit down to dinner at the same moment -- halftime. Hubbard's Law: Don't take life too seriously; you won't get out of it alive. The problem that we thought was a problem was, indeed, a problem, but not the problem we thought was the problem. -- Mike Smith Sic transit gloria mundi. [So passes away the glory of this world.] -- Thomas `a Kempis Progress means replacing a theory that is wrong with one more subtly wrong. Quod licet Iovi non licet bovi. (What Jove may do, is not permitted to a cow.) leverage, n.: Even if someone doesn't care what the world thinks about them, they always hope their mother doesn't find out. It's the opinion of some that crops could be grown on the moon. Which raises the fear that it may not be long before we're paying somebody not to. -- Franklin P. Jones I never cheated an honest man, only rascals. They wanted something for nothing. I gave them nothing for something. -- Joseph "Yellow Kid" Weil Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward. Cursor, n.: One whose program will not run. -- Robb Russon > I thing you're missing the capability of Makefiles. It takes several _hours_ to do `make' a second time on my machine with the latest glibc sources (and no files are recompiled a second time). I think I'll remove `build' after changing one file if I want to recompile it. -- Juan Cespedes When we jumped into Sicily, the units became separated, and I couldn't find anyone. Eventually I stumbled across two colonels, a major, three captains, two lieutenants, and one rifleman, and we secured the bridge. Never in the history of war have so few been led by so many. -- General James Gavin I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behind. -- George Bernard Shaw consultant, n.: Someone who knowns 101 ways to make love, but can't get a date. "Laugh while you can, monkey-boy." -- Dr. Emilio Lizardo You will always have good luck in your personal affairs. The lights are on, but you're not home; Your will is not your own; Your heart sweats, Your teeth grind; Another kiss and you'll be mine... You like to think that you're immune to the stuff (Oh Yeah!) It's closer to the truth to say you can't get enough; You know you're gonna have to face it, You're addicted to love!" -- Robert Palmer "It's hard to believe that something which is neither seen nor felt can do so much harm." "That's true. But an idea can't be seen or felt. And that's what kept the Troglytes in the mines all these centuries. A mistaken idea." -- Vanna and Kirk, "The Cloud Minders", stardate 5819.0 Friends may come and go, but enemies accumulate. -- Thomas Jones Q: What do you have when you have a lawyer buried up to his neck in sand? A: Not enough sand. Tax, title, tag, and dealer handling not included. The speed of anything depends on the flow of everything. Process promptly. He played the king as if afraid someone else would play the ace. -- John Mason Brown, drama critic Some of the most interesting documents from Sweden's middle ages are the old county laws (well, we never had counties but it's the nearest equivalent I can find for "landskap"). These laws were written down sometime in the 13th century, but date back even down into Viking times. The oldest one is the Vastgota law which clearly has pagan influences, thinly covered with some Christian stuff. In this law, we find a page about "lekare", which is the Old Norse word for a performing artist, actor/jester/musician etc. Here is an approximate translation, where I have written "artist" as equivalent of "lekare". "If an artist is beaten, none shall pay fines for it. If an artist is wounded, one such who goes with hurdie-gurdie or travels with fiddle or drum, then the people shall take a wild heifer and bring it out on the hillside. Then they shall shave off all hair from the heifer's tail, and grease the tail. Then the artist shall be given newly greased shoes. Then he shall take hold of the heifer's tail, and a man shall strike it with a sharp whip. If he can hold her, he shall have the animal. If he cannot hold her, he shall endure what he received, shame and wounds." All of the true things I am about to tell you are shameless lies. -- The Book of Bokonon / Kurt Vonnegut Jr. This code passes Torvalds test grades 0, 1 and 2 (it looks ok, it compiles and it booted). -- Alan Cox 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 C Code. C Code Run. Run, Code, RUN! PLEASE!!!! Monitor not included. So we follow our wandering paths, and the very darkness acts as our guide and our doubts serve to reassure us. -- Jean-Pierre de Caussade, eighteenth-century Jesuit priest I opened the drawer of my little desk and a single letter fell out, a letter from my mother, written in pencil, one of her last, with unfinished words and an implicit sense of her departure. It's so curious: one can resist tears and "behave" very well in the hardest hours of grief. But then someone makes you a friendly sign behind a window... or one notices that a flower that was in bud only yesterday has suddenly blossomed... or a letter slips from a drawer... and everything collapses. -- Letters From Colette There are many people today who literally do not have a close personal friend. They may know something that we don't. They are probably avoiding a great deal of pain. "Buy land. They've stopped making it." -- Mark Twain Eat right, stay fit, and die anyway. Gibble, Gobble, we ACCEPT YOU ... A soft drink turneth away company. Stay on the trail. Writing non-free software is not an ethically legitimate activity, so if people who do this run into trouble, that's good! All businesses based on non-free software ought to fail, and the sooner the better. -- Richard Stallman 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" Dime is money. That's life for you, said McDunn. Someone always waiting for someone who never comes home. Always someone loving something more than that thing loves them. And after awhile you want to destroy whatever that thing is, so it can't hurt you no more. -- R. Bradbury, "The Fog Horn" Ever wonder if taxation without representation might have been cheaper? He who laughs last hasn't been told the terrible truth. Supervisor: Do you think you understand the basic ideas of Quantum Mechanics? Supervisee: Ah! Well, what do we mean by "to understand" in the context of Quantum Mechanics? Supervisor: You mean "No", don't you? Supervisee: Yes. -- Overheard at a supervision. You are a bundle of energy, always on the go. Q: What's hard going in and soft and sticky coming out? A: Chewing gum. The opossum is a very sophisticated animal. It doesn't even get up until 5 or 6 PM. Dear Lord: Please make my words sweet and tender, for tomorrow I may have to eat them. A lot of people I know believe in positive thinking, and so do I. I believe everything positively stinks. -- Lew Col Give me the avowed, the erect, the manly foe, Bold I can meet -- perhaps may turn his blow! But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can send, Save me, oh save me from the candid friend. -- George Canning Every successful person has had failures but repeated failure is no guarantee of eventual success. It hangs down from the chandelier Nobody knows quite what it does Its color is odd and its shape is weird It emits a high-sounding buzz It grows a couple of feet each day and wriggles with sort of a twitch Nobody bugs it 'cause it comes from a visiting uncle who's rich! -- To "It Came Upon A Midnight Clear" Finagle's Seventh Law: The perversity of the universe tends toward a maximum. 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. Everybody is given the same amount of hormones, at birth, and if you want to use yours for growing hair, that's fine with me. Well, fancy giving money to the Government! Might as well have put it down the drain. Fancy giving money to the Government! Nobody will see the stuff again. Well, they've no idea what money's for -- Ten to one they'll start another war. I've heard a lot of silly things, but, Lor'! Fancy giving money to the Government! -- A. P. Herbert You will be winged by an anti-aircraft battery. "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin, 1759 "It is hard to overstate the debt that we owe to men and women of genius." -- Robert G. Ingersoll The only real game in the world, I think, is baseball... You've got to start way down, at the bottom, when you're six or seven years old. You can't wait until you're fifteen or sixteen. You've got to let it grow up with you, and if you're successful and you try hard enough, you're bound to come out on top, just like these boys have come to the top now. -- Babe Ruth, in his 1948 farewell speech at Yankee Stadium "There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it." -- C. S. Lewis, "The Chronicles of Narnia" Good day to avoid cops. Crawl to school. There's an old proverb that says just about whatever you want it to. The true way goes over a rope which is not stretched at any great height but just above the ground. It seems more designed to make people stumble than to be walked upon. -- Franz Kafka Beauty is truth, truth beauty, that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. -- John Keats Once there was a little nerd who loved to read your mail, And then yank back the i-access times to get hackers off his tail, And once as he finished reading from the secretary's spool, He wrote a rude rejection to her boyfriend (how uncool!) And this as delivermail did work and he ran his backfstat, He heard an awful crackling like rat fritters in hot fat, And hard errors brought the system down 'fore he could even shout! And the bio bug'll bring yours down too, ef you don't watch out! And once they was a little flake who'd prowl through the uulog, And when he went to his blit that night to play at being god, The ops all heard him holler, and they to the console dashed, But when they did a ps -ut they found the system crashed! Oh, the wizards adb'd the dumps and did the system trace, And worked on the file system 'til the disk head was hot paste, But all they ever found was this: "panic: never doubt", And the bio bug'll crash your box too, ef you don't watch out! When the day is done and the moon comes out, And you hear the printer whining and the rk's seems to count, When the other desks are empty and their terminals glassy grey, And the load is only 1.6 and you wonder if it'll stay, You must mind the file protections and not snoop around, Or the bio bug'll getcha and bring the system down! Be different: conform. True, it returns "" for false, but "" is an even more interesting number than 0. -- Larry Wall in <199707300650.XAA05515@wall.org> Ballistophobia: Fear of bullets; Otophobia: Fear of opening one's eyes. Peccatophobia: Fear of sinning. Taphephobia: Fear of being buried alive. Sitophobia: Fear of food. Trichophobbia: Fear of hair. Vestiphobia: Fear of clothing. "I have more information in one place than anybody in the world." -- Jerry Pournelle, an absurd notion, apparently about the BIX BBS I'll turn over a new leaf. -- Miguel de Cervantes I bet the human brain is a kludge. -- Marvin Minsky To the systems programmer, users and applications serve only to provide a test load. Only two groups of people fall for flattery -- men and women. Ah, but a man's grasp should exceed his reach, Or what's a heaven for ? -- Robert Browning, "Andrea del Sarto" "None of our men are "experts." We have most unfortunately found it necessary to get rid of a man as soon as he thinks himself an expert -- because no one ever considers himself expert if he really knows his job. A man who knows a job sees so much more to be done than he has done, that he is always pressing forward and never gives up an instant of thought to how good and how efficient he is. Thinking always ahead, thinking always of trying to do more, brings a state of mind in which nothing is impossible. The moment one gets into the "expert" state of mind a great number of things become impossible." -- From Henry Ford Sr., "My Life and Work," p. 86 (1922): To write a sonnet you must ruthlessly strip down your words to naked, willing flesh. Then bind them to a metaphor or three, and take by force a satisfying mesh. Arrange them to your will, each foot in place. You are the master here, and they the slaves. Now whip them to maintain a constant pace and rhythm as they stand in even staves. A word that strikes no pleasure? Cast it out! What use are words that drive not to the heart? A lazy phrase? Discard it, shrug off doubt, and choose more docile words to take its part. A well-trained sonnet lives to entertain, by making love directly to the brain. A hundred thousand lemmings can't be wrong! Don't interfere with the stranger's style. "Trust me. I know what I'm doing." -- Sledge Hammer I fear explanations explanatory of things explained. You have a tendency to feel you are superior to most computers. If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error. -- John Kenneth Galbraith If an average person on the subway turns to you, like an ancient mariner, and starts telling you her tale, you turn away or nod and hope she stops, not just because you fear she might be crazy. If she tells her tale on camera, you might listen. Watching strangers on television , even responding to them from a studio audience, we're disengaged -- voyeurs collaborating with exhibitionists in rituals of sham community. Never have so many known so much about people for whom they cared so little. -- Wendy Kaminer commenting on testimonial television in "I'm Dysfunctional, You're Dysfunctional". It looked like something resembling white marble, which was probably what it was: something resembling white marble. -- Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" Fog Lamps, n.: Excessively (often obnoxiously) bright lamps mounted on the fronts of automobiles; used on dry, clear nights to indicate that the driver's brain is in a fog. See also "Idiot Lights". Neither spread the germs of gossip nor encourage others to do so. [In 'Doctor' mode], I spent a good ten minutes telling Emacs what I thought of it. (The response was, 'Perhaps you could try to be less abusive.') -- Matt Welsh manual, n.: A unit of documentation. There are always three or more on a given item. One is on the shelf; someone has the others. The information you need is in the others. -- Ray Simard I would rather spend 10 hours reading someone else's source code than 10 minutes listening to Musak waiting for technical support which isn't. -- Dr. Greg Wettstein, Roger Maris Cancer Center A penny saved is a penny to squander. -- Ambrose Bierce -- Gifts for Children -- This is easy. You never have to figure out what to get for children, because they will tell you exactly what they want. They spend months and months researching these kinds of things by watching Saturday- morning cartoon-show advertisements. Make sure you get your children exactly what they ask for, even if you disapprove of their choices. If your child thinks he wants Murderous Bob, the Doll with the Face You Can Rip Right Off, you'd better get it. You may be worried that it might help to encourage your child's antisocial tendencies, but believe me, you have not seen antisocial tendencies until you've seen a child who is convinced that he or she did not get the right gift. -- Dave Barry, "Christmas Shopping: A Survivor's Guide" In short, at least give the penguin a fair viewing. If you still don't like it, that's ok: that's why I'm boss. I simply know better than you do. -- Linus "what, me arrogant?" Torvalds, on c.o.l.advocacy Ever get the feeling that the world's on tape and one of the reels is missing? -- Rich Little Condense soup, not books! I'm thinking about DIGITAL READ-OUT systems and computer-generated IMAGE FORMATIONS ... Oh, give me a home, Where the buffalo roam, And I'll show you a house with a really messy kitchen. 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 Love means having to say you're sorry every five minutes. Humans do claim a great deal for that particular emotion (love). -- Spock, "The Lights of Zetar", stardate 5725.6 Klingon function calls do not have 'parameters' -- they have 'arguments' -- and they ALWAYS WIN THEM. ... when fits of creativity run strong, more than one programmer or writer has been known to abandon the desktop for the more spacious floor. -- Fred Brooks Building translators is good clean fun. -- T. Cheatham Living in New York City gives people real incentives to want things that nobody else wants. -- Andy Warhol Do not cut switchbacks. The confusion of a staff member is measured by the length of his memos. -- New York Times, Jan. 20, 1981 It is necessary for the welfare of society that genius should be privileged to utter sedition, to blaspheme, to outrage good taste, to corrupt the youthful mind, and generally to scandalize one's uncles. -- George Bernard Shaw Weekend, where are you? Brain fried -- Core dumped I have more hit points that you can possible imagine. Behold, the fool saith, "Put not all thine eggs in the one basket"--which is but a manner of saying, "Scatter your money and your attention;" but the wise man saith, "Put all your eggs in the one basket and--WATCH THAT BASKET." -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" People are unconditionally guaranteed to be full of defects. Kafka's Law: In the fight between you and the world, back the world. -- Franz Kafka, "RS's 1974 Expectation of Days" May be too intense for some viewers. The true way goes over a rope which is not stretched at any great height but just above the ground. It seems more designed to make people stumble than to be walked upon. -- Franz Kafka Disco oil bussing will create a throbbing naugahide pipeline running straight to the tropics from the rug producing regions and devalue the dollar! Dear Mister Language Person: What is the purpose of the apostrophe? Answer: The apostrophe is used mainly in hand-lettered small business signs to alert the reader than an "S" is coming up at the end of a word, as in: WE DO NOT EXCEPT PERSONAL CHECK'S, or: NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ITEM'S. Another important grammar concept to bear in mind when creating hand- lettered small-business signs is that you should put quotation marks around random words for decoration, as in "TRY" OUR HOT DOG'S, or even TRY "OUR" HOT DOG'S. -- Dave Barry, "Tips for Writer's" There are two ways of disliking art. One is to dislike it. The other is to like it rationally. -- Oscar Wilde 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 Avoid the Gates of Hell. Use Linux (Unknown source) Didja' ever have to make up your mind, Pick up on one and leave the other behind, It's not often easy, and it's not often kind, Didja' ever have to make up your mind? -- Lovin' Spoonful We know all about the habits of the ant, we know all about the habits of the bee, but we know nothing at all about the habits of the oyster. It seems almost certain that we have been choosing the wrong time for studying the oyster. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" I knew I'd hate COBOL the moment I saw they'd used "perform" instead of "do". -- Larry Wall on a not-so-popular programming language You may get an opportunity for advancement today. Watch it! Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the drug store, but that's just peanuts to space. -- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Stealing a rhinoceros should not be attempted lightly. As Zeus said to Narcissus, "Watch yourself." Turn the other cheek. -- Jesus Christ I have a box of telephone rings under my bed. Whenever I get lonely, I open it up a little bit, and I get a phone call. One day I dropped the box all over the floor. The phone wouldn't stop ringing. I had to get it disconnected. So I got a new phone. I didn't have much money, so I had to get an irregular. It doesn't have a five. I ran into a friend of mine on the street the other day. He said why don't you give me a call. I told him I can't call everybody I want to anymore, my phone doesn't have a five. He asked how long had it been that way. I said I didn't know -- my calendar doesn't have any sevens. -- Steven Wright Was my SOY LOAF left out in th'RAIN? It tastes REAL GOOD!! The Official MBA Handbook on the use of sunlamps: Use a sunlamp only on weekends. That way, if the office wise guy remarks on the sudden appearance of your tan, you can fabricate some story about a sun-stroked weekend at some island Shangri-La like Caneel Bay. Nothing is more transparent than leaving the office at 11:45 on a Tuesday night, only to return an Aztec sun god at 8:15 the next morning. Please stand for the National Anthem: Oh, say can you see by dawn's early light What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming? Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming? And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there. Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave? Thank you. You may resume your seat. Stealing a rhinoceros should not be attempted lightly. Advertising is a valuable economic factor because it is the cheapest way of selling goods, particularly if the goods are worthless. -- Sinclair Lewis Any excuse will serve a tyrant. -- Aesop Nothing takes the taste out of peanut butter quite like unrequited love. -- Charlie Brown Pound for pound, the amoeba is the most vicious animal on earth. Amnesia used to be my favorite word, but then I forgot it. This product is meant for educational purposes only. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental. Void where prohibited. Some assembly may be required. Batteries not included. Contents may settle during shipment. Use only as directed. May be too intense for some viewers. If condition persists, consult your physician. No user-serviceable parts inside. Breaking seal constitutes acceptance of agreement. Not responsible for direct, indirect, incidental or consequential damages resulting from any defect, error or failure to perform. Slippery when wet. For office use only. Substantial penalty for early withdrawal. Do not write below this line. Your cancelled check is your receipt. Avoid contact with skin. Employees and their families are not eligible. Beware of dog. Driver does not carry cash. Limited time offer, call now to insure prompt delivery. Use only in well-ventilated area. Keep away from fire or flame. Some equipment shown is optional. Price does not include taxes, dealer prep, or delivery. Penalty for private use. Call toll free before digging. Some of the trademarks mentioned in this product appear for identification purposes only. All models over 18 years of age. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Postage will be paid by addressee. Apply only to affected area. One size fits all. Many suitcases look alike. Edited for television. No solicitors. Reproduction strictly prohibited. Restaurant package, not for resale. Objects in mirror are closer than they appear. Decision of judges is final. This supersedes all previous notices. No other warranty expressed or implied. Universe, n.: The problem. While most peoples' opinions change, the conviction of their correctness never does. People will buy anything that's one to a customer. One day, A mad meta-poet, With nothing to say, Wrote a mad meta-poem That started: "One day, A mad meta-poet, With nothing to say, Wrote a mad meta-poem That started: "One day, [...] sort of close". Were the words that the poet, Finally chose, To bring his mad poem, To some sort of close". Were the words that the poet, Finally chose, To bring his mad poem, To some sort of close". For every bloke who makes his mark, there's half a dozen waiting to rub it out. -- Andy Capp Tim and I a hunting went We found three damsels in a tent, As they were three, and we were two, I bucked one and Timbuktu. -- the only known poem using the word "Timbuktu" There must be at least 500,000,000 rats in the United States; of course, I never heard the story before. 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. Santa Claus is watching! Many Myths are based on truth -- Spock, "The Way to Eden", stardate 5832.3 Give your very best today. Heaven knows it's little enough. In Brooklyn, we had such great pennant races, it made the World Series just something that came later. -- Walter O'Malley, Dodgers owner I believe that if people would learn to use LSD's vision-inducing capability more wisely, under suitable conditions, in medical practice and in conjunction with meditation, then in the future this problem child could become a wonder child. -- Dr. Albert Hoffman, the discoverer of LSD Science is to computer science as hydrodynamics is to plumbing. program, n.: A magic spell cast over a computer allowing it to turn one's input into error messages. tr.v. To engage in a pastime similar to banging one's head against a wall, but with fewer opportunities for reward. There is no grief which time does not lessen and soften. It is not doing the thing we like to do, but liking the thing we have to do, that makes life blessed. -- Goethe There are those who claim that magic is like the tide; that it swells and fades over the surface of the earth, collecting in concentrated pools here and there, almost disappearing from other spots, leaving them parched for wonder. There are also those who believe that if you stick your fingers up your nose and blow, it will increase your intelligence. -- The Teachings of Ebenezum, Volume VII They collapsed ... like nuns in the street ... they had no teen appeal! 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 Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, If I should die before I wake, I'll cry in anguish, "Mistake!! Mistake!!" Power corrupts. And atomic power corrupts atomically. The Arrogant Worms describe Canada: Our mountains are very pointy; our prairies are not. The rest is kinda bumpy, but man, do we have a lot! -- From "Canada's Really Big" God made the integers; all else is the work of Man. -- Kronecker No anchovies unless otherwise specified. The man scarce lives who is not more credulous than he ought to be.... The natural disposition is always to believe. It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough. -- Adam Smith Absence makes the heart grow fonder -- of somebody else. Pray: To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy. -- Ambrose Bierce When a float occurs on the same page as the start of a supertabular you can expect unexpected results. -- Documentation of supertabular.sty As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality. -- Albert Einstein The biggest mistake you can make is to believe that you are working for someone else. 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 Confession is good for the soul, but bad for the career. C++ is the best example of second-system effect since OS/360. You mentioned your name as if I should recognize it, but beyond the obvious facts that you are a bachelor, a solicitor, a freemason, and an asthmatic, I know nothing whatever about you. -- Sherlock Holmes, "The Norwood Builder" Safety Net-ism: The belief that there will always be a financial and emotional safety net to buffer life's hurts. Usually parents. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Penalty for private use. 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" "Evil does seek to maintain power by suppressing the truth." "Or by misleading the innocent." -- Spock and McCoy, "And The Children Shall Lead", stardate 5029.5. I just remembered something about a TOAD! sushi, n.: When that-which-may-still-be-alive is put on top of rice and strapped on with electrical tape. "Mind if I smoke?" "Yes, I'd like to see that, does it come out of your ears or what?" Populus vult decipi. [The people like to be deceived.] You will be audited by the Internal Revenue Service. When you say that you agree to a thing in principle, you mean that you have not the slightest intention of carrying it out in practice. -- Otto Von Bismarck Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped. -- Elbert Hubbard I'd better put the incriminating stuff into code: ahfuiovka ikperoa edfr ade 9 enbuw ejasxleme ka iena df4mesa If you can decrypt that, you're a better cryptographer than I am. =) I wouldn't marry her with a ten foot pole. 'Course, I haven't weighed in yet. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199710281816.KAA29614@wall.org> The most dangerous organization in America today is: (a) The KKK (b) The American Nazi Party (c) The Delta Frequent Flyer Club There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened. -- Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" It is now quite lawful for a Catholic woman to avoid pregnancy by a resort to mathematics, though she is still forbidden to resort to physics and chemistry. -- H. L. Mencken If the very old will remember, the very young will listen. -- Chief Dan George It is a sobering thought that when Mozart was my age, he had been dead for two years. -- Tom Lehrer Welcome to Lake Wobegon, where all the men are strong, the women are pretty, and the children are above-average. -- Garrison Keillor Hotels are tired of getting ripped off. I checked into a hotel and they had towels from my house. -- Mark Guido `Just the place for a Snark!' the Bellman cried, As he landed his crew with care; Supporting each man on the top of the tide By a finger entwined in his hair. 'Just the place for a Snark! I have said it twice: That alone should encourage the crew. Just the place for a Snark! I have said it thrice: What I tell you three times is true.' "I understand this is your first dead client," Sabian was saying. The absurdity of the statement made me want to laugh but they don't call me Deadpan Allie and lie. -- Pat Cadigan, "Mindplayers" Anyone who says he can see through women is missing a lot. -- Groucho Marx God requireth not a uniformity of religion. -- Roger Williams "Linux poses a real challenge for those with a taste for late-night hacking (and/or conversations with God)." (By Matt Welsh) I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behind. -- George Bernard Shaw Depends on how you define "always". :-) -- Larry Wall in <199710211647.JAA17957@wall.org> A Hen Brooding Kittens A friend informs us that he saw at the Novato ranch, Marin county, a few days since, a hen actually brooding and otherwise caring for three kittens! The gentleman upon whose premises this strange event is transpiring says the hen adopted the kittens when they were but a few days old, and that she has devoted them her undivided care for several weeks past. The young felines are now of respectable size, but they nevertheless follow the hen at her cluckings, and are regularly brooded at night beneath her wings. -- Sacramento Daily Union, July 2, 1861 When we talk of tomorrow, the gods laugh. We don't need no indirection We don't need no compilation We don't need no flow control We don't need no load control No data typing or declarations No link edit for external bindings Hey! did you leave the lists alone? Hey! did you leave that source alone? Chorus: (Chorus) Oh No. It's just a pure LISP function call. We don't need no side-effecting We don't need no allocation We don't need no flow control We don't need no special-nodes No global variables for execution No dark bit-flipping for debugging Hey! did you leave the args alone? Hey! did you leave those bits alone? (Chorus) (Chorus) -- "Another Glitch in the Call", a la Pink Floyd 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" "What was the worst thing you've ever done?" "I won't tell you that, but I'll tell you the worst thing that ever happened to me... the most dreadful thing." -- Peter Straub, "Ghost Story" QOTD: "I haven't come far enough, and don't call me baby." Voodoo Programming: Things programmers do that they know shouldn't work but they try anyway, and which sometimes actually work, such as recompiling everything. -- Karl Lehenbauer I see the eigenvalue in thine eye, I hear the tender tensor in thy sigh. Bernoulli would have been content to die Had he but known such _a-squared cos 2(phi)! -- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad" Being popular is important. Otherwise people might not like you. Ignorance must certainly be bliss or there wouldn't be so many people so resolutely pursuing it. "World domination. Fast" (By Linus Torvalds) 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. Patience is the best remedy for every trouble. -- Titus Maccius Plautus The geographical center of Boston is in Roxbury. Due north of the center we find the South End. This is not to be confused with South Boston which lies directly east from the South End. North of the South End is East Boston and southwest of East Boston is the North End. The 11 is for people with the pride of a 10 and the pocketbook of an 8. -- R. B. Greenberg [referring to PDPs?] meetings, n.: A place where minutes are kept and hours are lost. Peace If you offer music and food Strangers may stop with you; But if you accord with the Way All the people of the world will keep you In safety, health, community, and peace. The Way lacks art and flavour; It can neither be seen nor heard, But its benefit cannot be exhausted. -- Lao Tse, "Tao Te Ching" Miksch's Law: If a string has one end, then it has another end. Desist from enumerating your fowl prior to their emergence from the shell. Classical music is the kind we keep thinking will turn into a tune. -- Kin Hubbard, "Abe Martin's Sayings" Semper Fi, dude. In the next world, you're on your own. Our houseplants have a good sense of humous. Ada, the only language written to milspec. Windows without the X is like making love without a partner. -- MaDsen Wikholm, mwikholm@at8.abo.fi 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 "Few sins are less forgivable in polite society than offering poor people products they actively seek." -- Katherine Mangu-Ward, "Education for Profit", Reason Magazine, July 2008 HUGH BEAUMONT died in 1982!! The brotherhood of man is not a mere poet's dream; it is a most depressing and humiliating reality. -- Oscar Wilde "Can you program?" "Well, I'm literate, if that's what you mean!" Granted, RMS is a fanatic, I don't deny this. I'll even say he's a royal pain in the arse most of the time. But he's still more often right than not, and he deserves some level of credit and respect for his work. We would NOT be here today without him. Please go away. Remember the... the... uhh..... "If the King's English was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for me!" -- "Ma" Ferguson, Governor of Texas (circa 1920) The trouble with computers is that they do what you tell them, not what you want. -- D. Cohen In a surprise raid last night, federal agents ransacked a house in search of a rebel computer hacker. However, they were unable to complete the arrest because the warrant was made out in the name of Don Provan, while the only person in the house was named don provan. Proving, once again, that Unix is superior to Tops10. Lots of folks confuse bad management with destiny. -- Frank Hubbard You can measure a programmer's perspective by noting his attitude on the continuing viability of FORTRAN. -- Alan Perlis The important thing to remember about walking on eggs is not to hop. There are new messages. How many Unix hacks does it take to change a light bulb? Let's see, can you use a shell script for that or does it need a C program? It isn't an optical illusion. It just looks like one. ... If I had heart failure right now, I couldn't be a more fortunate man!! Being frustrated is disagreeable, but the real disasters in life begin when you get what you want. "For the love of phlegm...a stupid wall of death rays. How tacky can ya get?" -- Post Brothers comics It would seem that evil retreats when forcibly confronted. -- Yarnek of Excalbia, "The Savage Curtain", stardate 5906.5 If rash develops, discontinue use. The human brain is a wonderful thing. It starts working the moment you are born, and never stops until you stand up to speak in public. -- Sir George Jessel Subject: Linux box finds it hard to wake up in the morning I've heard of dogs being like their owners, but Linux boxen? -- Peter Hunter My ritual differs slightly. What I do, first thing [in the morning], is I hop into the shower stall. Then I hop right back out, because when I hopped in I landed barefoot right on top of See Threepio, a little plastic robot character from "Star Wars" whom my son, Robert, likes to pull the legs off of while he showers. Then I hop right back into the stall because our dog, Earnest, who has been alone in the basement all night building up powerful dog emotions, has come bounding and quivering into the bathroom and wants to greet me with 60 or 70 thousand playful nips, any one of which -- bear in mind that I am naked and, without my contact lenses, essentially blind -- could result in the kind of injury where you have to learn a whole new part if you want to sing the "Messiah," if you get my drift. Then I hop right back out, because Robert, with that uncanny sixth sense some children have -- you cannot teach it; they either have it or they don't -- has chosen exactly that moment to flush one of the toilets. Perhaps several of them. -- Dave Barry $3,000,000. Might not be suitable for persons suffering from weak hearts. A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on. -- Samuel Goldwyn Help me, I'm a prisoner in a Fortune cookie file! FORTRAN is a good example of a language which is easier to parse using ad hoc techniques. -- D. Gries [What's good about it? Ed.] Ogden's Law: The sooner you fall behind, the more time you have to catch up. "We are on the verge: Today our program proved Fermat's next-to-last theorem." -- Epigrams in Programming, ACM SIGPLAN Sept. 1982 Probable-Possible, my black hen, She lays eggs in the Relative When. She doesn't lay eggs in the Positive Now Because she's unable to postulate How. -- Frederick Winsor I have no right, by anything I do or say, to demean a human being in his own eyes. What matters is not what I think of him; it is what he thinks of himself. To undermine a man's self-respect is a sin. -- Antoine de Saint-Exupery Unix will self-destruct in five seconds... 4... 3... 2... 1... Have a nice diurnal anomaly. Intel CPUs are not defective, they just act that way. -- Henry Spencer Well, fancy giving money to the Government! Might as well have put it down the drain. Fancy giving money to the Government! Nobody will see the stuff again. Well, they've no idea what money's for -- Ten to one they'll start another war. I've heard a lot of silly things, but, Lor'! Fancy giving money to the Government! -- A. P. Herbert Per buck you get more computing action with the small computer. -- R. W. Hamming 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. An idea is not responsible for the people who believe in it. The Sixth Commandment of Frisbee: The greatest single aid to distance is for the disc to be going in a direction you did not want. (Goes the wrong way = Goes a long way.) -- Dan Roddick As I was walking down the street one dark and dreary day, I came upon a billboard and much to my dismay, The words were torn and tattered, From the storm the night before, The wind and rain had done its work and this is how it goes, Smoke Coca-Cola cigarettes, chew Wrigleys Spearmint beer, Ken-L-Ration dog food makes your complexion clear, Simonize your baby in a Hershey candy bar, And Texaco's a beauty cream that's used by every star. Take your next vacation in a brand new Frigedaire, Learn to play the piano in your winter underwear, Doctors say that babies should smoke until they're three, And people over sixty-five should bathe in Lipton tea. Humor in the Court: Q. Officer, what led you to believe the defendant was under the influence? A. Because he was argumentary and he couldn't pronunciate his words. A mighty creature is the germ, Though smaller than the pachyderm. His customary dwelling place Is deep within the human race. His childish pride he often pleases By giving people strange diseases. Do you, my poppet, feel infirm? You probably contain a germ. -- Ogden Nash Prediction is very difficult, especially of the future. -- Niels Bohr The best thing about being bald is, that, when unexpected company arrives, all you have to do is straighten your tie. There's no real need to do housework -- after four years it doesn't get any worse. 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. For I swore I would stay a year away from her; out and alas! but with break of day I went to make supplication. -- Paulus Silentarius, c. 540 A.D. I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behind. -- George Bernard Shaw Government's Law: There is an exception to all laws. Acting is an art which consists of keeping the audience from coughing. You can now buy more gates with less specifications than at any other time in history. -- Kenneth Parker A mind is a wonderful thing to waste. Pay toll ahead. If you are not for yourself, who will be for you? If you are for yourself, then what are you? If not now, when? So much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens. -- William Carlos Williams, "The Red Wheel Barrow" It's reassuring to know that if you behave strangely enough, society will take full responsibility for you. An infallible method of conciliating a tiger is to allow oneself to be devoured. -- Konrad Adenauer Kill Ugly Radio -- Frank Zappa By long-standing tradition, I take this opportunity to savage other designers in the thin disguise of good, clean fun. -- P. J. Plauger, "Computer Language", 1988, April Fool's column. If a child annoys you, quiet him by brushing his hair. If this doesn't work, use the other side of the brush on the other end of the child. "It's today!" said Piglet. "My favorite day," said Pooh. I just ate a whole package of Sweet Tarts and a can of Coke. I think I saw God. -- B. Hathrume Duk System going down in 5 minutes. Is not marriage an open question, when it is alleged, from the beginning of the world, that such as are in the institution wish to get out, and such as are out wish to get in? -- Ralph Emerson penis jokes are okay in mixed company. VMS is NOT!!! What the gods would destroy they first submit to an IEEE standards committee. QOTD: "What women and psychologists call `dropping your armor', we call "baring your neck." Some men are heterosexual, and some are bisexual, and some men don't think about sex at all... they become lawyers. -- Woody Allen A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices. -- William James Boy! Eucalyptus! Uh-oh -- WHY am I suddenly thinking of a VENERABLE religious leader frolicking on a FORT LAUDERDALE weekend? Lack of capability is usually disguised by lack of interest. She asked me, "What's your sign?" I blinked and answered "Neon," I thought I'd blow her mind... A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away. -- Barry Goldwater This sentence no verb. 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 * 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 liw: Umm it's too late to have the frog back? You may be sure that when a man begins to call himself a "realist," he is preparing to do something he is secretly ashamed of doing. -- Sydney Harris The clothes have no emperor. -- C. A. R. Hoare, commenting on ADA. So much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens. -- William Carlos Williams, "The Red Wheel Barrow" Love is in the offing. Be affectionate to one who adores you. I have seen the Great Pretender and he is not what he seems. Drive defensively. Buy a tank. #define SIGILL 6 /* blech */ -- Larry Wall in perl.c from the perl source code A conclusion is simply the place where someone got tired of thinking. 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" It's not Camelot, but it's not Cleveland, either. -- Kevin White, Mayor of Boston If atheism is to be used to express the state of mind in which God is identified with the unknowable, and theology is pronounced to be a collection of meaningless words about unintelligible chimeras, then I have no doubt, and I think few people doubt, that atheists are as plentiful as blackberries... -- Leslie Stephen (1832-1904), literary essayist, author It's appositival, if it's there. And it doesn't have to be there. And it's really obvious that it's there when it's there. -- Larry Wall in <199709032332.QAA21669@wall.org> Heard that the next Space Shuttle is supposed to carry several Guernsey cows? It's gonna be the herd shot 'round the world. The so-called lessons of history are for the most part the rationalizations of the victors. History is written by the survivors. -- Max Lerner Magnocartic, adj.: Any automobile that, when left unattended, attracts shopping carts. -- Sniglets, "Rich Hall & Friends" Please remain seated until the ride has come to a complete stop. learn to love Window Maker. a little NeXTStep is good for the soul. Is your job running? You'd better go catch it! You're at Witt's End. If you lived today as if it were your last, you'd buy up a box of rockets and fire them all off, wouldn't you? -- Garrison Keillor 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. To have died once is enough. -- Publius Vergilius Maro (Virgil) Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout in the milk. -- Thoreau QOTD: If you're looking for trouble, I can offer you a wide selection. Dirksen's Three Laws of Politics: (1) Get elected. (2) Get re-elected. (3) Don't get mad, get even. -- Sen. Everett Dirksen A mathematician, a doctor, and an engineer are walking on the beach and observe a team of lifeguards pumping the stomach of a drowned woman. As they watch, water, sand, snails and such come out of the pump. The doctor watches for a while and says: "Keep pumping, men, you may yet save her!!" The mathematician does some calculations and says: "According to my understanding of the size of that pump, you have already pumped more water from her body than could be contained in a cylinder 4 feet in diameter and 6 feet high." The engineer says: "I think she's sitting in a puddle." Sex dumps core (Sex is a Simple editor for X11) -- Seen on debian bugtracking A new koan: If you have some ice cream, I will give it to you. If you have no ice cream, I will take it away from you. It is an ice cream koan. 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" "There must be some mistake," he said, "are you not a greater computer than the Milliard Gargantubrain which can count all the atoms in a star in a millisecond?" "The Milliard Gargantubrain?" said Deep Thought with unconcealed contempt. "A mere abacus. Mention it not." -- Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy America works less, when you say "Union Yes!" Memory fault -- brain fried Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" Is your job running? You'd better go catch it! I smell like a wet reducing clinic on Columbus Day! In 1914, the first crossword puzzle was printed in a newspaper. The creator received $4000 down ... and $3000 across. The best way to make a fire with two sticks is to make sure one of them is a match. -- Will Rogers Q: What's the difference between USL and the Titanic? A: The Titanic had a band. "Although Poles suffer official censorship, a pervasive secret police and laws similar to those in the USSR, there are thousands of underground publications, a legal independent Church, private agriculture, and the East bloc's first and only independent trade union federation, NSZZ Solidarnosc, which is an affiliate of both the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions and the World Confederation of Labor. There is literally a world of difference between Poland - even in its present state of collapse - and Soviet society at the peak of its "glasnost." This difference has been maintained at great cost by the Poles since 1944. -- David Phillips, SUNY at Buffalo, about establishing a gateway from EARN (Eurpoean Academic Research Network) to Poland Good night, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are. What garlic is to food, insanity is to art. Lizzie Borden took an axe, And plunged it deep into the VAX; Don't you envy people who Do all the things ___YOU want to do? Character is what you are in the dark! -- Lord John Whorfin if (rsfp = mypopen("/bin/mail root","w")) { /* heh, heh */ -- Larry Wall in perl.c from the perl source code At the end of your life there'll be a good rest, and no further activities are scheduled. Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it himself. -- A. H. Weiler "Being against torture ought to be sort of a multipartisan thing." -- Karl Lehenbauer, as amended by Jeff Daiell, a Libertarian any gnome freaks around? not me, I'm just a freak The person who can smile when something goes wrong has thought of someone to blame it on. Concerning the war in Vietnam, Senator George Aiken of Vermount noted in January, 1966, "I'm not very keen for doves or hawks. I think we need more owls." -- Bill Adler, "The Washington Wits" Today you'll start getting heavy metal radio on your dentures. Out of sight is out of mind. -- Arthur Clough SHOP OR DIE, people of Earth! [offer void where prohibited] -- Capitalists from outer space, from Justice League Int'l comics Should I do my BOBBIE VINTON medley? Will your long-winded speeches never end? What ails you that you keep on arguing? -- Job 16:3 We cannot do everything at once, but we can do something at once. -- Calvin Coolidge "I love Saturday morning cartoons, what classic humour! This is what entertainment is all about ... Idiots, explosives and falling anvils." -- Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson I can feel for her because, although I have never been an Alaskan prostitute dancing on the bar in a spangled dress, I still get very bored with washing and ironing and dishwashing and cooking day after relentless day. -- Betty MacDonald "Thirty days hath Septober, April, June, and no wonder. all the rest have peanut butter except my father who wears red suspenders." The universe is all a spin-off of the Big Bang. "Danger, you haven't seen the last of me!" "No, but the first of you turns my stomach!" -- The Firesign Theatre's Nick Danger Stellar rays prove fibbing never pays. Embezzlement is another matter. "Elvis is my copilot." -- Cal Keegan Exercise caution in your daily affairs. lighthouse, n.: A tall building on the seashore in which the government maintains a lamp and the friend of a politician. "I think they're going to take all this money that we spend now on war and death --" "And make them spend it on life." -- Edith Keeler and Kirk, "The City on the Edge of Forever", stardate unknown. patent: A method of publicizing inventions so others can copy them. Unnamed Law: If it happens, it must be possible. Always draw your curves, then plot your reading. There's a couple of million dollars worth of baseball talent on the loose, ready for the big leagues, yet unsigned by any major league. There are pitchers who would win 20 games a season ... and outfielders [who] could hit .350, infielders who could win recognition as stars, and there's at least one catcher who at this writing is probably superior to Bill Dickey, Josh Gibson. Only one thing is keeping them out of the big leagues, the pigmentation of their skin. They happen to be colored. -- Shirley Povich, 1941 The louder he talked of his honour, the faster we counted our spoons. -- Ralph Waldo Emerson love, n.: Love ties in a knot in the end of the rope. The most dangerous food is wedding cake. -- American proverb Two wrights don't make a rong, they make an airplane. Or bicycles. You roll my log, and I will roll yours. -- Lucius Annaeus Seneca "It says he made us all to be just like him. So if we're dumb, then god is dumb, and maybe even a little ugly on the side." -- Frank Zappa One should always be in love. That is the reason one should never marry. -- Oscar Wilde Simon's Law: Everything put together falls apart sooner or later. "The one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception a necessity." -- Oscar Wilde The ideal voice for radio may be defined as showing no substance, no sex, no owner, and a message of importance for every housewife. -- Harry V. Wade The USA is so enormous, and so numerous are its schools, colleges and religious seminaries, many devoted to special religious beliefs ranging from the unorthodox to the dotty, that we can hardly wonder at its yielding a more bounteous harvest of gobbledegook than the rest of the world put together. -- Sir Peter Medawar Killing is stupid; useless! -- McCoy, "A Private Little War", stardate 4211.8 I was born in a Hostess Cupcake factory before the sexual revolution! Another goal is to establish a relationship "in which it is OK for everybody to do their best. There are an awful lot of people in management who really don't want subordinates to do their best, because it gets to be very threatening. But we have found that both internally and with outside designers if we are willing to have this kind of relationship and if we're willing to be vulnerable to what will come out of it, we get really good work." -- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988 Professor Gorden Newell threw another shutout in last week's Chem Eng. 130 midterm. Once again a student did not receive a single point on his exam. Newell has now tossed 5 shutouts this quarter. Newell's earned exam average has now dropped to a phenomenal 30%. Dry clean only. Well, some take delight in the carriages a-rolling, And some take delight in the hurling and the bowling, But I take delight in the juice of the barley, And courting pretty fair maids in the morning bright and early. There are times when truth is stranger than fiction and lunch time is one of them. The man on tops walks a lonely street; the "chain" of command is often a noose. Be valiant, but not too venturous. Let thy attire be comely, but not costly. -- John Lyly There's another way to survive. Mutual trust -- and help. -- Kirk, "Day of the Dove", stardate unknown An airplane pilot got engaged to two very pretty women at the same time. One was named Edith; the other named Kate. They met, discovered they had the same fiancee, and told him. "Get out of our lives you rascal. We'll teach you that you can't have your Kate and Edith, too." QOTD: "A child of 5 could understand this! Fetch me a child of 5." 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. Mount St. Helens should have used earth control. Save a little money each month and at the end of the year you'll be surprised at how little you have. -- Ernest Haskins "To YOU I'm an atheist; to God, I'm the Loyal Opposition." -- Woody Allen The notion that science does not concern itself with first causes -- that it leaves the field to theology or metaphysics, and confines itself to mere effects -- this notion has no support in the plain facts. If it could, science would explain the origin of life on earth at once--and there is every reason to believe that it will do so on some not too remote tomorrow. To argue that gaps in knowledge which will confront the seeker must be filled, not by patient inquiry, but by intuition or revelation, is simply to give ignorance a gratuitous and preposterous dignity.... -- H. L. Mencken, 1930 If I want your opinion, I'll ask you to fill out the necessary form. Break into jail and claim police brutality. No man in the world has more courage than the man who can stop after eating one peanut. -- Channing Pollock A young man and his girlfriend were walking along Main Street when she spotted a beautiful diamond ring in a jewelry-store window. "Wow, I'd sure love to have that!" she gushed. "No problem," her companion replied, throwing a brick through the window and grabbing the ring. A few blocks later, the woman admired a full-length sable coat. "What I'd give to own that," she said, sighing. "No problem," he said, throwing a brick through the window and grabbing the coat. Finally, turning for home, they passed a car dealership. "Boy, I'd do anything for one of those Rolls-Royces," she said. "Jeez, baby," the guy moaned, "you think I'm made of bricks?" You're always thinking you're gonna be the one that makes 'em act different. -- Woody Allen, "Manhattan" Farmers in the Iowa State survey rated machinery breakdowns more stressful than divorce. -- Wall Street Journal I don't like this official/unofficial distinction. It sound, er, officious. -- Larry Wall in <199702221943.LAA20388@wall.org> Jane and I got mixed up with a television show -- or as we call it back east here: TV -- a clever contraction derived from the words Terrible Vaudeville. However, it is our latest medium -- we call it a medium because nothing's well done. It was discovered, I suppose you've heard, by a man named Fulton Berle, and it has already revolutionized social grace by cutting down parlour conversation to two sentences: "What's on television?" and "Good night". -- Goodman Ace, letter to Groucho Marx, in The Groucho Letters, 1967 I want to be the white man's brother, not his brother-in-law. -- Martin Luther King, Jr. Suppose you're working on an optimizer to render \X unnecessary (or rather, redundant, which isn't the same thing in my book). -- Larry Wall in <199710211624.JAA17833@wall.org> "I always avoid prophesying beforehand because it is much better to prophesy after the event has already taken place. " - Winston Churchill 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" Perhaps I'm missing the gene for making enemies. :-) -- Larry Wall in <199708040319.UAA16213@wall.org> Poverty Lurks: Financial paranoia instilled in offspring by depression-era parents. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" It is the wisdom of crocodiles, that shed tears when they would devour. -- Francis Bacon I think, therefore I am... I think. I have to think hard to name an interesting man who does not drink. -- Richard Burton No house should ever be on any hill or on anything. It should be of the hill, belonging to it. -- Frank Lloyd Wright I went into the business for the money, and the art grew out of it. If people are disillusioned by that remark, I can't help it. It's the truth. -- Charlie Chaplin You will never amount to much. -- Munich Schoolmaster, to Albert Einstein, age 10 Dinner is ready when the smoke alarm goes off. It is not the critic who counts, or how the strong man stumbled, or whether the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, and who spends himself in a worthy cause, and if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that he'll never be with those cold and timid souls who never know either victory or defeat. -- Teddy Roosevelt You should never bet against anything in science at odds of more than about 10^12 to 1. -- Ernest Rutherford Chef, n.: Any cook who swears in French. echo $package has manual pages available in source form. echo "However, you don't have nroff, so they're probably useless to you." -- Larry Wall in Configure from the perl distribution Spiritual leadership should remain spiritual leadership and the temporal power should not become too important in any church. -- Eleanor Roosevelt Whitehead's Law: The obvious answer is always overlooked. Go away, I'm all right. -- H. G. Wells' last words. Brook's Law: Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later. List current at time of printing. The mature bohemian is one whose woman works full time. Dignity is like a flag. It flaps in a storm. -- Roy Mengot Uncompensated overtime? Just Say No. Computers make excellent and efficient servants, but I have no wish to serve under them. Captain, a starship also runs on loyalty to one man. And nothing can replace it or him. -- Spock, "The Ultimate Computer", stardate 4729.4 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" The church saves sinners, but science seeks to stop their manufacture. -- Elbert Hubbard "Now we'll have to kill you." -- Linus Torvalds Every silver lining has a cloud around it. Hey! Come merry dol! derry dol! My darling! Light goes the weather-wind and the feathered starling. Down along under Hill, shining in the sunlight, Waiting on the doorstep for the cold starlight, There my pretty lady is, River-woman's daughter, Slender as the willow-wand, clearer than the water. Old Tom Bombadil water-lilies bringing Comes hopping home again. Can you hear him singing? Hey! Come merry dol! derry dol! and merry-o Goldberry, Goldberry, merry yellow berry-o! Poor old Willow-man, you tuck your roots away! Tom's in a hurry now. Evening will follow day. Tom's going home again water-lilies bringing. Hey! come derry dol! Can you hear me singing? -- J. R. R. Tolkien I think it's a new feature. Don't tell anyone it was an accident. :-) -- Larry Wall on s/foo/bar/eieio in <10911@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> Drawing on my fine command of language, I said nothing. 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" Beam me up, Scotty! It ate my phaser! I'm pretending I'm pulling in a TROUT! Am I doing it correctly?? Do not disturb. Arnold's Addendum: Anything not fitting into these categories causes cancer in rats. Money is its own reward. Envy, n.: Wishing you'd been born with an unfair advantage, instead of having to try and acquire one. 18th Rule of Friendship: A friend will let you hold the ladder while he goes up on the roof to install your new aerial, which is the biggest son-of-a-bitch you ever saw. -- Esquire, May 1977 Pohl's law: Nothing is so good that somebody, somewhere, will not hate it. I cannot conceive that anybody will require multiplications at the rate of 40,000 or even 4,000 per hour ... -- F. H. Wales (1936) Certain passages in several laws have always defied interpretation and the most inexplicable must be a matter of opinion. A judge of the Court of Session of Scotland has sent the editors of this book his candidate which reads, "In the Nuts (unground), (other than ground nuts) Order, the expression nuts shall have reference to such nuts, other than ground nuts, as would but for this amending Order not qualify as nuts (unground) (other than ground nuts) by reason of their being nuts (unground)." -- Guiness Book of World Records, 1973 Excellent day for putting Slinkies on an escalator. Software, n.: Formal evening attire for female computer analysts. Pray to God, but keep rowing to shore. -- Russian Proverb You may have heard that a dean is to faculty as a hydrant is to a dog. -- Alfred Kahn I know th'MAMBO!! I have a TWO-TONE CHEMISTRY SET!! There is more simplicity in the man who eats caviar on impulse than in the man who eats Grape-Nuts on principle. -- G. K. Chesterton The IBM purchase of ROLM gives new meaning to the term "twisted pair". -- Howard Anderson, "Yankee Group" You don't have to think too hard when you talk to teachers. -- J. D. Salinger Why a man would want a wife is a big mystery to some people. Why a man would want *___two* wives is a bigamystery. Historical Slumming: The act of visiting locations such as diners, smokestack industrial sites, rural villages -- locations where time appears to have been frozen many years back -- so as to experience relief when one returns back to "the present." -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Beam me up, Scotty, there's no intelligent life down here! Noone ever built a statue to a critic. "All God's children are not beautiful. Most of God's children are, in fact, barely presentable." -- Fran Lebowitz How doth the VAX's C-compiler Improve its object code. And even as we speak does it Increase the system load. How patiently it seems to run And spit out error flags, While users, with frustration, all Tear their clothes to rags. Old age and treachery will overcome youth and skill. Wait for that wisest of all counselors, Time. -- Pericles Recursion is the root of computation since it trades description for time. A modest woman, dressed out in all her finery, is the most tremendous object in the whole creation. -- Goldsmith A new 'chutist had just jumped from the plane at 10,000 feet, and soon discovered that all his lines were hopelessly tangled. At about 5,000 feet, still struggling, he noticed someone coming up from the ground at about the same speed as he was going towards the ground. As they passed each other at 3,000 feet, the 'chutist yells, "HEY! DO YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT PARACHUTES?" The reply came, fading towards the end, "NO! DO YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT COLEMAN STOVES?" Purple hum Assorted cars Laser lights, you bring All to prove You're on the move and vanishing -- The Cars Bdale is a contraction of Barksdale. Hm. It's definItely not something I'll ever remember. Mind if I call you Wensleydale instead? Very few things actually get manufactured these days, because in an infinitely large Universe, such as the one in which we live, most things one could possibly imagine, and a lot of things one would rather not, grow somewhere. A forest was discovered recently in which most of the trees grew ratchet screwdrivers as fruit. The life cycle of the ratchet screwdriver is quite interesting. Once picked it needs a dark dusty drawer in which it can lie undisturbed for years. Then one night it suddenly hatches, discards its outer skin that crumbles into dust, and emerges as a totally unidentifiable little metal object with flanges at both ends and a sort of ridge and a hole for a screw. This, when found, will get thrown away. No one knows what the screwdriver is supposed to gain from this. Nature, in her infinite wisdom, is presumably working on it. Love conquers all things; let us too surrender to love. -- Publius Vergilius Maro (Virgil) Do you know the difference between a yankee and a damyankee? A yankee comes south to *_____visit*. This sentence contradicts itself -- no actually it doesn't. -- Douglas Hofstadter Put *that* in you .sig and smoke it, Knghtbrd. You know he will read this :> heheheheh. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. War is much too serious a matter to be entrusted to the military. -- Clemenceau Do you have exactly what I want in a plaid poindexter bar bat?? The reason why worry kills more people than work is that more people worry than work. 99 little bugs in the code, 99 bugs in the code, fix one bug, compile it again... 101 little bugs in the code.... The best way to accelerate a Macintoy is at 9.8 meters per second per second. linux: the choice of a GNU generation (ksh@cis.ufl.edu put this on Tshirts in '93) Your domestic life may be harmonious. Beware of a tall black man with one blond shoe. You're not my type. For that matter, you're not even my species!!! It is better for civilization to be going down the drain than to be coming up it. -- Henry Allen Then here's to the City of Boston, The town of the cries and the groans. Where the Cabots can't see the Kabotschniks, And the Lowells won't speak to the Cohns. -- Franklin Pierce Adams If rabbits' feet are so lucky, what happened to the rabbit? One FISHWICH coming up!! Perl 5 introduced everything else, including the ability to introduce everything else. -- Larry Wall in <199702252152.NAA28845@wall.org> "Our vision is to speed up time, eventually eliminating it." -- Alex Schure 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. is that really knghtbrd? No, I'm an EVIL IMPOSTOR! An evil impostor who LIKES HYBRID! haha ok, it's him :P The smiling Spring comes in rejoicing, And surly Winter grimly flies. Now crystal clear are the falling waters, And bonnie blue are the sunny skies. Fresh o'er the mountains breaks forth the morning, The ev'ning gilds the oceans's swell: All creatures joy in the sun's returning, And I rejoice in my bonnie Bell. The flowery Spring leads sunny Summer, The yellow Autumn presses near; Then in his turn come gloomy Winter, Till smiling Spring again appear. Thus seasons dancing, life advancing, Old Time and Nature their changes tell; But never ranging, still unchanging, I adore my bonnie Bell. -- Robert Burns, "My Bonnie Bell" My problem lies in reconciling my gross habits with my net income. -- Errol Flynn Any man who has $10,000 left when he dies is a failure. -- Errol Flynn Oh, when I was in love with you, Then I was clean and brave, And miles around the wonder grew How well did I behave. And now the fancy passes by, And nothing will remain, And miles around they'll say that I Am quite myself again. -- A. E. Housman Resisting temptation is easier when you think you'll probably get another chance later on. It's not an optical illusion, it just looks like one. -- Phil White Amnesia used to be my favorite word, but then I forgot it. Historic Overdosing: To live in a period of time when too much seems to happen. Major symptoms include addiction to newspapers, magazines, and TV news broadcasts. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" Row, row, row your bits, gently down the stream... Dijkstra probably hates me. -- Linus Torvalds, in kernel/sched.c One would like to stroke and caress human beings, but one dares not do so, because they bite. -- Vladimir Il'ich Lenin We are not a loved organization, but we are a respected one. -- John Fisher Rules for Academic Deans: (1) HIDE!!!! (2) If they find you, LIE!!!! -- Father Damian C. Fandal I called my parents the other night, but I forgot about the time difference. They're still living in the fifties. -- Strange de Jim During the voyage of life, remember to keep an eye out for a fair wind; batten down during a storm; hail all passing ships; and fly your colors proudly. If you have never been hated by your child, you have never been a parent. -- Bette Davis Your aim is high and to the right. Most rock journalism is people who can't write interviewing people who can't talk for people who can't read. -- Frank Zappa Research is to see what everybody else has seen, and think what nobody else has thought. I don't know WHY I said that ... I think it came from the FILLINGS in my rear molars ... The only difference between a rut and a grave is their dimensions. May cause drowsiness. quit When the quit statement is read, the bc processor is terminated, regardless of where the quit state- ment is found. For example, "if (0 == 1) quit" will cause bc to terminate. -- seen in the manpage for "bc". Note the "if" statement's logic Most bacteria have the decency to be microscopic. Epulopiscium fishelsoni is not among them. The newly identified one-celled macro-microorganism is a full .5 mm long, large enough to be seen with the naked eye. Described in the current Nature, "It is a million times as massive as a typical bacterium."-Time, page 25, March 29, 1993 Kissing a fish is like smoking a bicycle. MOCK APPLE PIE (No Apples Needed) Pastry to two crust 9-inch pie 36 RITZ Crackers 2 cups water 2 cups sugar 2 teaspoons cream of tartar 2 tablespoons lemon juice Grated rind of one lemon Butter or margarine Cinnamon Roll out bottom crust of pastry and fit into 9-inch pie plate. Break RITZ Crackers coarsely into pastry-lined plate. Combine water, sugar and cream of tartar in saucepan, boil gently for 15 minutes. Add lemon juice and rind. Cool. Pour this syrup over Crackers, dot generously with butter or margarine and sprinkle with cinnamon. Cover with top crust. Trim and flute edges together. Cut slits in top crust to let steam escape. Bake in a hot oven (425 F) 30 to 35 minutes, until crust is crisp and golden. Serve warm. Cut into 6 to 8 slices. -- Found lurking on a Ritz Crackers box The good oxymoron, to define it by a self-illustration, must be a planned inadvertency. -Wilson Follett **** GROWTH CENTER REPAIR SERVICE For those who have had too much of Esalen, Topanga, and Kairos. Tired of being genuine all the time? Would you like to learn how to be a little phony again? Have you disclosed so much that you're beginning to avoid people? Have you touched so many people that they're all beginning to feel the same? Like to be a little dependent? Are perfect orgasms beginning to bore you? Would you like, for once, not to express a feeling? Or better yet, not be in touch with it at all? Come to us. We promise to relieve you of the burden of your great potential. I made it a rule to forbear all direct contradictions to the sentiments of others, and all positive assertion of my own. I even forbade myself the use of every word or expression in the language that imported a fixed opinion, such as "certainly", "undoubtedly", etc. I adopted instead of them "I conceive", "I apprehend", or "I imagine" a thing to be so or so; or "so it appears to me at present". When another asserted something that I thought an error, I denied myself the pleasure of contradicting him abruptly, and of showing him immediately some absurdity in his proposition. In answering I began by observing that in certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right, but in the present case there appeared or seemed to me some difference, etc. I soon found the advantage of this change in my manner; the conversations I engaged in went on more pleasantly. The modest way in which I proposed my opinions procured them a readier reception and less contradiction. I had less mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily prevailed with others to give up their mistakes and join with me when I happened to be in the right. -- Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin Real computer scientists like having a computer on their desk, else how could they read their mail? All that you touch, And all you create, All that you see, And all you destroy, All that you taste, All that you do, All you feel, And all you say, And all that you love, All that you eat, And all that you hate, And everyone you meet, All you distrust, All that you slight, All you save, And everyone you fight, And all that you give, And all that is now, And all that you deal, And all that is gone, All that you buy, And all that's to come, Beg, borrow or steal, And everything under the sun is in tune, But the sun is eclipsed By the moon. There is no dark side of the moon... really... matter of fact it's all dark. -- Pink Floyd, "Dark Side of the Moon" Elwood: What kind of music do you get here ma'am? Barmaid: Why, we get both kinds of music, Country and Western. Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd. -- Voltaire You know it's Monday when you wake up and it's Tuesday. -- Garfield A computer salesman visits a company president for the purpose of selling the president one of the latest talking computers. Salesman: "This machine knows everything. I can ask it any question and it'll give the correct answer. Computer, what is the speed of light?" Computer: 186,282 miles per second. Salesman: "Who was the first president of the United States?" Computer: George Washington. President: "I'm still not convinced. Let me ask a question. Where is my father?" Computer: Your father is fishing in Georgia. President: "Hah!! The computer is wrong. My father died over twenty years ago!" Computer: Your mother's husband died 22 years ago. Your father just landed a twelve pound bass. Information Center, n.: A room staffed by professional computer people whose job it is to tell you why you cannot have the information you require. question = ( to ) ? be : ! be; -- Wm. Shakespeare What is tolerance? -- it is the consequence of humanity. We are all formed of frailty and error; let us pardon reciprocally each other's folly -- that is the first law of nature. -- Voltaire emacs sucks, literally, not a insult, just a comment that its large enough to have a noticeable gravitational pull... Do not stamp. To be great is to be misunderstood. -- Ralph Waldo Emerson 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 They're only trying to make me LOOK paranoid! You have a strong appeal for members of your own sex. THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #18: FIFTH FIFTH is a precision mathematical language in which the data types refer to quantity. The data types range from CC, OUNCE, SHOT, and JIGGER to FIFTH (hence the name of the language), LITER, MAGNUM and BLOTTO. Commands refer to ingredients such as CHABLIS, CHARDONNAY, CABERNET, GIN, VERMOUTH, VODKA, SCOTCH, and WHATEVERSAROUND. The many versions of the FIFTH language reflect the sophistication and financial status of its users. Commands in the ELITE dialect include VSOP and LAFITE, while commands in the GUTTER dialect include HOOTCH and RIPPLE. The latter is a favorite of frustrated FORTH programmers who end up using this language. There once was a master programmer who wrote unstructured programs. A novice programmer, seeking to imitate him, also began to write unstructured programs. When the novice asked the master to evaluate his progress, the master criticized him for writing unstructured programs, saying: "What is appropriate for the master is not appropriate for the novice. You must understand the Tao before transcending structure." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" Lack of capability is usually disguised by lack of interest. If we men married the women we deserved, we should have a very bad time of it. -- Oscar Wilde Sometimes a man who deserves to be looked down upon because he is a fool is despised only because he is a lawyer. -- Montesquieu If you are of the opinion that the contemplation of suicide is sufficient evidence of a poetic nature, do not forget that actions speak louder than words. -- Fran Lebowitz, "Metropolitan Life" It is impossible to travel faster than light, and certainly not desirable, as one's hat keeps blowing off. -- Woody Allen "Right now I'm having amnesia and deja vu at the same time." -- Steven Wright Never leave anything to chance; make sure all your crimes are premeditated. Hello. Jim Rockford's machine, this is Larry Doheny's machine. Will you please have your master call my master at his convenience? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. -- "The Rockford Files" Genius, n.: A chemist who discovers a laundry additive that rhymes with "bright." 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" Every man who is high up likes to think that he has done it all himself, and the wife smiles and lets it go at that. -- Barrie Nasrudin walked into a shop one day, and the owner came forward to serve him. Nasrudin said, "First things first. Did you see me walk into your shop?" "Of course." "Have you ever seen me before?" "Never." "Then how do you know it was me?" Largest Number of Driving Test Failures By April 1970 Mrs. Miriam Hargrave had failed her test thirty-nine times. In the eight preceding years she had received two hundred and twelve driving lessons at a cost of L300. She set the new record while driving triumphantly through a set of red traffic lights in Wakefield, Yorkshire. Disappointingly, she passed at the fortieth attempt (3 August 1970) but eight years later she showed some of her old magic when she was reported as saying that she still didn't like doing right-hand turns. -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures" Two men looked out from the prison bars, One saw mud-- The other saw stars. Now let me get this right: two prisoners are looking out the window. While one of them was looking at all the mud -- the other one got hit in the head. In buying horses and taking a wife shut your eyes tight and commend yourself to God. "If it's not loud, it doesn't work!" -- Blank Reg, from "Max Headroom" Florence Flask was ... dressing for the opera when she turned to her husband and screamed, "Erlenmeyer! My joules! Someone has stolen my joules!" "Now, now, my dear," replied her husband, "keep your balance and reflux a moment. Perhaps they're mislead." "No, I know they're stolen," cried Florence. "I remember putting them in my burette ... We must call a copper." Erlenmeyer did so, and the flatfoot who turned up, one Sherlock Ohms, said the outrage looked like the work of an arch-criminal by the name of Lawrence Ium. "We must be careful -- he's a free radical, ultraviolet, and dangerous. His girlfriend is a chlorine at the Palladium. Maybe I can catch him there." With that, he jumped on his carbon cycle in an activated state and sped off along the reaction pathway ... -- Daniel B. Murphy, "Precipitations" Good day to deal with people in high places; particularly lonely stewardesses. I just thought of something funny...your mother. -- Cheech Marin Mystics always hope that science will some day overtake them. -- Booth Tarkington ok guys .. so whens the next commit :PP when they come to get me Fortune Documents the Great Legal Decisions: We think that we may take judicial notice of the fact that the term "bitch" may imply some feeling of endearment when applied to a female of the canine species but that it is seldom, if ever, so used when applied to a female of the human race. Coming as it did, reasonably close on the heels of two revolver shots directed at the person of whom it was probably used, we think it carries every reasonable implication of ill-will toward that person. -- Smith v. Moran, 193 N.E. 2d 466. Today is the first day of the rest of the mess. Keep grandma off the streets -- legalize bingo. Victory or defeat! To be beautiful is enough! if a woman can do that well who should demand more from her? You don't want a rose to sing. -- Thackeray I saw what you did and I know who you are. Rincewind had generally been considered by his tutors to be a natural wizard in the same way that fish are natural mountaineers. He probably would have been thrown out of Unseen University anyway--he couldn't remember spells and smoking made him feel ill. -- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic" My polyvinyl cowboy wallet was made in Hong Kong by Montgomery Clift! All articles that coruscate with resplendence are not truly auriferous. There will be big changes for you but you will be happy. "His eyes were cold. As cold as the bitter winter snow that was falling outside. Yes, cold and therefore difficult to chew..." taxidermist, n.: A man who mounts animals. If it doesn't smell yet, it's pretty fresh. -- Dave Johnson, on dead seagulls Not all men who drink are poets. Some of us drink because we aren't poets. Basically, I want people to know that when they use binary-only modules, it's THEIR problem. I want people to know that in their bones, and I want it shouted out from the rooftops. I want people to wake up in a cold sweat every once in a while if they use binary-only modules. -- Linus Torvalds Every creature has within him the wild, uncontrollable urge to punt. -- Snoopy An expert is one who knows more and more about less and less until he knows absolutely everything about nothing. In my experience, if you have to keep the lavatory door shut by extending your left leg, it's modern architecture. -- Nancy Banks Smith i just bought MS Office 2000 for only $20!!! you got ripped off ;> i know ;) It is a human characteristic to love little animals, especially if they're attractive in some way. -- McCoy, "The Trouble with Tribbles", stardate 4525.6 BE ALERT!!!! (The world needs more lerts...) "The net result is a system that is not only binary compatible with 4.3 BSD, but is even bug for bug compatible in almost all features." -- Avadit Tevanian, Jr., "Architecture-Independent Virtual Memory Management for Parallel and Distributed Environments: The Mach Approach" A continuing flow of paper is sufficient to continue the flow of paper. -- Dyer To program is to be. Not that I'm against sneaking some notions into people's heads upon occasion. (Or blasting them in outright.) -- Larry Wall in <199710211624.JAA17833@wall.org> You have a deep interest in all that is artistic. What I need is a MATURE RELATIONSHIP with a FLOPPY DISK ... It is much easier to suggest solutions when you know nothing about the problem. Q: What do you call the scratches that you get when a female sheep bites you? A: Ewe nicks. 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?" UNIX was half a billion (500000000) seconds old on Tue Nov 5 00:53:20 1985 GMT (measuring since the time(2) epoch). -- Andy Tanenbaum Data, n.: An accrual of straws on the backs of theories. Help stamp out and abolish redundancy and repetition. All the really good ideas I ever had came to me while I was milking a cow. -- Grant Wood Federal law prohibits dispensing without a prescription. October. This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks in. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August, and February. -- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar" This font is starting to come out very nicely Knghtbrd: oh dear, are you hacking up another quake font in vi? :) I believe that professional wrestling is clean and everything else in the world is fixed. -- Frank Deford, sports writer "Now here's something you're really going to like!" -- Rocket J. Squirrel Alaska: A prelude to "No." If the rich could pay the poor to die for them, what a living the poor could make! Desist from enumerating your fowl prior to their emergence from the shell. "Marriage is low down, but you spend the rest of your life paying for it." -- Baskins Thus spake the master programmer: "Time for you to leave." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" Any coward can sit in his home and criticize a pilot for flying into a mountain in a fog. But I would rather, by far, die on a mountainside than in bed. What kind of man would live where there is no daring? And is life so dear that we should blame men for dying in adventure? Is there a better way to die? -- Charles Lindbergh The City of Palo Alto, in its official description of parking lot standards, specifies the grade of wheelchair access ramps in terms of centimeters of rise per foot of run. A compromise, I imagine... Safety Net-ism: The belief that there will always be a financial and emotional safety net to buffer life's hurts. Usually parents. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture" To write good code is a worthy challenge, and a source of civilized delight. -- stolen and paraphrased from William Safire This message was written with vi! (not that anyone in the world cares) -- seen on an old message from an anon.penet.fi address A quarrel is quickly settled when deserted by one party; there is no battle unless there be two. -- Seneca "Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature... Life is either a daring adventure or nothing." -- Helen Keller Bumper sticker: All the parts falling off this car are of the very finest British manufacture. A young honeymoon couple were touring southern Florida and happened to stop at one of the rattlesnake farms along the road. After seeing the sights, they engaged in small talk with the man that handled the snakes. "Gosh!" exclaimed the new bride. "You certainly have a dangerous job. Don't you ever get bitten by the snakes?" "Yes, upon rare occasions," answered the handler. "Well," she continued, "just what do you do when you're bitten by a snake?" "I always carry a razor-sharp knife in my pocket, and as soon as I am bitten, I make deep criss-cross marks across the fang entry and then suck the poison from the wound." "What, uh... what would happen if you were to accidentally *sit* on a rattler?" persisted the woman. "Ma'am," answered the snake handler, "that will be the day I learn who my real friends are." Cruickshank's Law of Committees: If a committee is allowed to discuss a bad idea long enough, it will inevitably decide to implement the idea simply because so much work has already been done on it. Never laugh at live dragons. -- Bilbo Baggins [J.R.R. Tolkien, "The Hobbit"] I think that's easier to read. Pardon me. Less difficult to read. -- Larry Wall in <199710120226.TAA06867@wall.org> To stay youthful, stay useful. One doesn't have a sense of humor. It has you. -- Larry Gelbart Whoever asked if the debian organization was dead isn't reading debian-devel. 66 messages in one day, and it's not over. I find it difficult to keep up. -- Bruce Perens "Yacc" owes much to a most stimulating collection of users, who have goaded me beyond my inclination, and frequently beyond my ability in their endless search for "one more feature." Their irritating unwillingness to learn how to do things my way has usually led to my doing things their way; most of the time, they have been right. -- S. C. Johnson, "Yacc guide acknowledgements" Ever wonder why fire engines are red? Because newspapers are read too. Two and Two is four. Four and four is eight. Eight and four is twelve. There are twelve inches in a ruler. Queen Mary was a ruler. Queen Mary was a ship. Ships sail the sea. There are fishes in the sea. Fishes have fins. The Finns fought the Russians. Russians are red. Fire engines are always rush'n. Therefore fire engines are red. You can destroy your now by worrying about tomorrow. -- Janis Joplin "... I should explain that I was wearing a black velvet cape that was supposed to make me look like the dashing, romantic Zorro but which actually made me look like a gigantic bat wearing glasses ..." -- Dave Barry, "The Wet Zorro Suit and Other Turning Points in l'Amour" When you get your PH.D. will you get able to work at BURGER KING? The Official MBA Handbook on the use of sunlamps: Use a sunlamp only on weekends. That way, if the office wise guy remarks on the sudden appearance of your tan, you can fabricate some story about a sun-stroked weekend at some island Shangri-La like Caneel Bay. Nothing is more transparent than leaving the office at 11:45 on a Tuesday night, only to return an Aztec sun god at 8:15 the next morning. 186,282 miles per second: It isn't just a good idea, it's the law! birth, n: The first and direst of all disasters. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" What one fool can do, another can. -- Ancient Simian Proverb Genius is the talent of a person who is dead. Captain Penny's Law: You can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you Can't Fool Mom. Laugh and the world thinks you're an idiot. Two cars in every pot and a chicken in every garage. To a New Yorker, all Californians are blond, even the blacks. There are, in fact, whole neighborhoods that are zoned only for blond people. The only way to tell the difference between California and Sweden is that the Swedes speak better English." -- From "East vs. West: The War Between the Coasts Life is like an onion: you peel off layer after layer and then you find there is nothing in it. -- James Huneker Your CHEEKS sit like twin NECTARINES above a MOUTH that knows no BOUNDS -- Snoopy: No problem is so big that it can't be run away from.