Copy Link
Add to Bookmark
Report
The Purple Thunderbolt of spode Volume 2 Issue 34
***** ***** ***** *****
***** ***** ***** *****
************* ************* ************* *************
** *** ** ** *** ** ** *** ** ** *** **
********* ********* ********* *********
** ** ** ** ** ** ** **
***** ***** ***** *****
SBI-Submarine Pens Proudly Presents:
####========================================================####
THE PURPLE THUNDERBOLT OF SPODE VOL 2, 34
####========================================================####
"One year and REPLIES TO: HailOtis@socpsy.sci.fau.edu
still going strong"
* PPPPPP U U RRRRRR PPPPPP SSSSSS
*** P P U U R R P P S
***** P P U U R R P P S
******* PPPPPP U U RRRRRR PPPPPP SSSSS
********* P U U R R P S
*********** P U U R RR P S
***** P UUUUU R R P SSSSSS
*****
*****
*****
*****
* **** *
*** *** ***
**** * *****
************************************
****************************************
************************************
**** ***** *****
*** ***** ***
* ***** *
*****
*****
*****
*****
*****
***********
*********
*******
*****
***
*
WRITE TO: IGHF/955 Massachusetts Ave., Suite 209/Cambridge, Ma 02139
####===================================================================####
INTRO
####===================================================================####
Welcome to a brand new year. Yes, it's 1992. A brand new year to spread the
truth of Otis! 365 days of pure OTISian fun. [Let's just pretend I wrote
that bit on January 1 instead of a few minutes before I mailed this out.]
I'm sorry for the delay about getting this out. The mailer we use has not
been allowing out going mail for over a month. This is mostly due to the
load we were placing on it. You'll notice this came to you by another
address. The address at the top of this is still very valid. It just cannot
be used for mass mailings at this time. We'll survive. [As I recall the
Pope might have a similar problem in his stint of editing. Perhaps it's
time to cry "Religious Oppression!" Or is it Spode just throwing a spanner
into the works to make our job here at the Submarine Pens trickier?]
One point that has come to my attention recently is how to pronounce
OTISian? Does one say OTIS-ian or Oteesian similar to Parisian? We should
settle this point immediately seeing as we don't want the unwashed masses
thinking there are two religions out there. [Then again, we might be able to
bilk the gullible out of two donations instead of one.]
Another point I should raise is submissions. Besides the various sundry
hardware, holiday and mailer problems we had, there was a lack of
submissions. This was probably because of the holidays, so no biggie.
Anyway, I encourage each and every one of you folks reading this to send us
along something. We can always use more submissions. Make your place in the
sun. Become famous for 15 minutes as it were. Purps now goes out all over
the computer to OTIS knows where. Our subscription list is just the tip of
the iceberg I gather. Also, Purps does go out through the snail mail and
who knows whom that reaches. So you see, it's easy. Submit to Otis and become
famous. [And when you do, remember to donate some of that money you gained
off being in Purps to the IGHF.]
As for the Pope, he is alive and well. We just received a missive in the mail
from him. No doubt maybe of you have received one as well. I case you
didn't here's some of what he said:
"Despite the lag and the changes, however, we have, in all false modesty,
one hell of a good issue [The Otisian Directory] coming up (HAIL OTIS!),
with guest reviews [by the Infamous Doc Simpson. Maybe he'll reveal some of
what he found in the Gobi on his last expedition.] (he promises me) and
several other folks, more original 'fiction' than we've ever published before
(including work by Glenn Russell, if he lets me, and Judy Fitzgerald), more
art than you can shake a stick at (hey, what you do with your free time is
your own business), and (HAIL OTIS!!!!) absolutely NO poetry to speak of. So
far I'm looking at around 40 pages (a double issue), although budget
constraints may scale it back somewhat. Our estimated date of publication is
FEB. 15, WAY behind schedule, but it can't be helped. Deadline for
submissions [use address at top of Purps] (which, if you asked, we are still
accepting), is 2/10 for "printer ready" material, 2/1 if you want me to
typeset or otherwise prepare anything."
Probably soon we'll have an official announcement on this but I figured the
Pope wouldn't mind giving you a sneak preview. With the more or less
demise, or dormancy of Fact Sheet Five The Directory may be one of your
best bets to find neat stuff.
Okay enough preaching and on with the show. This issue is huge. About a
week ago or so submissions started trickling in which I'm more than
thankful for. I've also received a few by mail as well.
I hope that the next issue will come out at it's supposed to-- Two weeks
from now.
####===================================================================####
NEWS OF THE WEIRD
####===================================================================####
From: Fawn Fitter real live Freelance Journalist. Look for her up coming
article "in Cosmopolitan".
[News of the Weird by Chuck Shepherd]
Time magazine reported in June a growing trend in Third World countries of
people selling their organs to brokers in order to improve their standard
of living. In high demand are kidneys (typical price, $2,000), corneas
($4,000) and skin ($50 a patch). One tailor was interviewed after having
sold a kidney to pay for this daughter's wedding.
In July policed entering a suburban Detroit home found an intoxicated
5-year-old boy who was smoking a cigarette and demonstrating a sex act. He
said he had just been given gin by his father.
Robert L. Barber, a biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in the
federal office building in downtown Atlanta, collects bullet shells during
his lunch-hour walks. He claimed recently to have acquired more than 10
pounds of lead and brass casings in the last for year just within a
five-block radius so his office.
The Texas Department of Human Services rushed radio public-service
announcement out in July to combat a "crisis" in teenage pregnancy after
learning of a 24-year-old grandmother.
In Kansas City, Mo., a 41-year-old man was hospitalized in March after a
botched burglary attempt. He had been surprised by an off-duty police
officer as he was attempting to burglarize a Dillard's department store.
His accomplice jumped in their getaway car and attempted to run over the
officer, who managed to get out of the way, but the burglar didn't and was
run over and injured severely.
Five employees at the Pacer Industries plant in Pensacola, Fla., were
overcome by carbon monoxide in a workplace accident this summer. The
company makes auto parts, including devices to detect carbon monoxide.
During March's Firefighters Association cook-off in San Antonio, Texas, a
fire stared in the grassy area housing the barbecue grills, then spread and
ultimately damaged more than 100 cars before it was contained.
Tony Zappia, 33, of Santa Monica, Calif,. was seriously inured in April in
an incident that began when a bird sitting on a lamppost relieved itself on
Zappia's head. Angered, Zappia began shaking the lamppost but only
succeeded in loosening a large bulb, which crashed onto his head,
fracturing his skull.
The Ottawa Civic Hospital heart-patient wing, newly constructed and as yet
without patients, was nonetheless to be the site of a long-awaited visit by
Britain's Princess Diana in October. The hospital thus gathered former
patients who had been treated in other part of the hospital to come to the
heart wing, put pajamas on and lie in bed and greet the princess.
Jesus Henderson, 22, was arrested in St. Paul, Minn., fleeing the sandwich
shop he had just robbed. His escape dash happened to take him past a police
precinct station during a shift change, with many officers going in and out
of the building. And Arthur Bringe, 60, a Chicago nursing-home resident,
tried to rob the First National Band in Ma on payday for the nearby police
precinct. He was arrested when the teller signaled a uniformed sergeant in
her line that Bringe had handed her a hold up note.
Michael Michell, 40, a prison escapee from Montana, was arrested in August
while attending a Seattle Mainers baseball game. He as in line at a
souvenir stand at the ballpark right in front of Montana State Prison
Warden Jack McCormick who was attending the game while on vacation.
McCormick later said: "He was real surprised to see me. I said, "Hi Mike,
how are you doing?"
Donna Endicott was driving on I-84 near Portland, Ore, in May when she
noticed that the car in front of her was hers, which has been stole
recently. She followed the car for about 20 minutes until it sopped in
front of a house and two men got out. She jumped into the stolen car and
drove away. The men had gotten out to commit a robbery, and when they
emerged from the house, they had no getaway car and were captured less than
an hour later.
Terry Goodman, a construction worker in San Jose, Calif., who was using a
portable toilet when a forklift operator picked it up and moved it to
another location won $89,000 in a May lawsuit for the resulted injuries.
In Quarkertown, Pa., Gladys Diehl and her husband filed a lawsuit last
spring against the Sealy mattress company and Hess' department store,
claiming that a 26-inch-long snake had been living in side the mattress
they purchased. It was the couples second such mattress; after the felt
slithering in the first one, they exchanged for rot a second one, then felt
slithering in that one, too. They took the second mattress to a testing
laboratory, where the snake, by the dead, as discovered.
The National Easter Seal society sued the American Lung Association (which
issues "Christmas seals") last summer in Madison, Wis., to prevent it from
using the concept of "seals" for fun-raising campaigns.
####===================================================================####
JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT BROCCOLI WAS SAFE TO EAT
####===================================================================####
Subject: Too sick to believe (Maybe George is right!?).
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 91 17:09:48 -0500
From: "Sam Hill Cabal, DS" <tsdavies@mailbox.syr.edu>
>From: Ted.Taylor@p4214.f104.n109.z1.FidoNet.Org (Ted Taylor)
Subject: A Word of Warning...
Date: 16 Dec 91 02:23:46 EST
I'm posting this with the deepest regret, but I have to tell you about the
broccoli I got at the market on Saturday. NICE broccoli, high price, fresh
and just the right color, and it even came with a band around the stalks
saying "NO pesticides/insecticides/preservatives." "Wonderful," I thought
to myself, "even with all the problems they're having in California, we can
still get great produce from California, here on the east coast. Isn't
America wonderful?"
The broccoli tasted great, too -- my wife and I each had a clump, and I
steamed half of the rest of it for a quiche.
On closer inspection -- fortunately, BEFORE putting the broccoli into the
quiche -- it turned out the head was utterly infested with white flies.
Little guys, just slightly bigger than the "beads" at the end of broccoli
floret, and kinda gray/white in color. And lots of them -- thousands, I
think. (I'm not exaggerating. Once I knew what I was looking for, I
couldn't turn over a floret without seeing a lot of white flies.)
Froze the unused portion with the steamed half, got my money back (no
argument, you betcha). But the really bad news is... I can't trust
broccoli any more. Not until they solve the white fly problem.
What to look for (and yes, if you know what they are you can spot them in
the store) is little ovals (with very fine legs sticking out,
mosquito-like), about half-way between an "o" and a "." in size. QUITE
small, and if you browse through the broccoli florets, there's a fair
chance of finding some.
As many as were on this one head of broccoli (many hundreds? a few
thousands?), it's clear it will take an enormous eradication program to get
rid of these little devils. And it should also be clear that prices will
go up, and that we'll have to get used to a lot more insecticide in our
food, too. And once those trucks from California come our way, this coming
spring, those white flies are going to be /everywhere/ in these United
States.
There is one bright side to this. The little bug(ger)s are darned tasty.
My wife and I thought it was the best broccoli we ever had, until we found
out why it tasted different from other broccoli we'd had. Sweet, and
crunchy -- just like broccoli ought to be.
-- T <still rinsing and spitting> T
####===================================================================####
THE AMAZING WORLD OF SPODE
####===================================================================####
Date: Sat, 21 Dec 1991 11:08 HKT
From: "Mighty Spode God of Chaos" <LBSPODIC@USTHK.BITNET>
Subject: tidbits to brighten your weekend...
_Lai See_ - South China Morning Post - 13 December 1991
_No Kidding_
A colleague reminded us of a town in the United States called Big
Ugly. Some years ago, a child went missing, but was found safe a few
days later.
The headline in the local newspaper the following day said it all:
Big Ugly Child Found.
+++++++++++++++++++++
_Lai See_ - South China Morning Post - 21 November 1991
_Customs gets a wee bit of the old pooh-pooh_
It's tough being an international zoo worker. Customs officers
are simply not understanding enough about what one has to take through
barriers.
This we heard from a senior Hongkong executive who met a panda
specialist from San Diego Zoo on a Dragonair flight.
The zoo executive was passing through Hongkong on a trip to Fuzhou
Zoo, to meet her Chinese counterparts.
Customs officers do not easily accept that the alcoholic-looking
liquid you are carrying is "panda urine", she sighed.
You need all sorts of equipment.
People are surprised to learn that pandas are not naturally kind
and gentle, but this behavior has to be coaxed out of them, she said.
How?
She plucked a specially-designed panda marital aid out of her bag -
another nightmare to explain to the customs desk.
The worst thing is when you have to transport a sample of animal
matter that looks exactly like cannabis, she said.
Picture the beefy, unsympathetic customs guard pointing at this
packet of illicit-looking brown crumbly stuff.
"And what do you call this, madam?"
"Dragon poo."
But it was. She had to carry feces samples from a Komodo dragon.
It is the sort of reply that makes customs officials smile
pityingly and lock you up.
+++++++++++++++++++++
_Lai See_ - South China Morning Post - 3 December 1991
_Legal Lights_
Now this is an abuse-the-lawyers story written by a lawyer. You can
tell from the style.
How many lawyers does it take to change a light bulb?
(1). The party of the first part, also known as "Lawyer", shall, with
or without elevation at his option, by ladder or any other means of
elevation, grasp the party of the second part, also known as "Light Bulb",
and rotate the part of the second part in a counterclockwise direction.
(2). Upon reaching a point where the party of the second part (Light
Bulb) becomes separated from the party of the third part ("Receptacle"),
the party of the first part (Lawyer) shall have the option of disposing
of the party of the second part (Light Bulb) in a manner consistent with
all applicable statutes.
(3). Once separation and disposal have been achieved, the party of the
first part (Lawyer) shall have the option of beginning installation of the
party of the fourth part ("New Light Bulb").
Etc, etc.
+++++++++++++++++++++
_Lai See_ - South China Morning Post - 26 September 1991
_Square Circles_
Reader Neil McLaughlin phoned 824-6111, a number described in the
telephone directory as "Immigration - All Inquiries".
The voice said he could not help, as he only dealt with General
Inquiry.
"I asked for the extension number of someone who might be able to
help me," said Mr. McLaughlin.
He said that that was also a Special Inquiry, so he could not
answer it.
"I asked him if he could connect me to someone else who knew
somebody else who knew who I should be speaking to."
He was given the number of the Main Directory, which he called.
"I have a Special Inquiry to make," he said.
"Please explain the nature of your inquiry."
He obliged.
"That is a General Inquiry. Call 824-6111."
Click.
+++++++++++++++++++++
South China Morning Post - 13 December 1991
_Rum Stolen by Elephants_
NEW DELHI: Army officials in West Bengal asked the forestry department
to find a way to stop elephants from swiping rum from their camp store.
Bagdogra base officers said the elephants had figured out how to
bridge electric fences with logs and use their trunks to hose out fires
lit to keep them away from the liquor.
====
####===================================================================####
BY THE BALLS OF BROW
####===================================================================####
[Here's the info you've all been waiting for. Snatch them up before they're
all gone.]
Date: Thu, 16 Jan 92 00:28:57 CST
From: "Reverend John" <UC521832@UMCVMB.missouri.edu>
Oh OTISian faithful....
Are ye saved? Are ye lost? Are ye confused? Do the names which swirl
about each issue of PURPS drive you to drink?
Then fear not. You are on the right path.
To help you along that path, material from the first twenty issues of PURPS
has been assembled in an EZ-2-Read paper format. It's 8.5" by 14", not
folded, just stapled so you get big floppy pages that looks cool on your
coffee table or when hawked from soap boxes on street corners. 26 pages
jam-packed more or less with articles, stories, drinking games, and more.
Lots of essential OTISian material on the basics of what's what and who's
who that you probably haven't even guessed at. Lovingly compiled and
hand-assembled by the Rev under his own Pagan Publishing, The Balls of Brow
is available now for OTISian fun enhancement. Yow!
To order: send the Rev $3 cash, check, money order, whatever, as
follows...
Pagan Publishing
c/o Rev. John Tynes
1409 Wilson Ave.
Columbia, MO 65201
Make checks/MO's payable to Rev. John Tynes
By The Balls Of Brow is just what you need to make sense of all this
silliness. Act quick...and wear your tin foil.
####===================================================================####
FREUD ON SEUSS
####===================================================================####
Date: Thu, 26 Dec 1991 14:53 HKT
From: "Spode, God/ess of Chaos!" <LBSPODIC@USTHK.BITNET>
Subject: Humor - Freud on Seuss
Freud on Seuss
a book review by Josh LeBeau
(copied from the Koala, UCSD's humour newspaper, which has no
copyright notices in it anywhere)
_The Cat in the Hat_
by Dr. Seuss, 61 pages. Beginner Books, $3.95
The Cat in the Hat is a hard-hitting novel of prose and poetry in which the
author re-examines the dynamic rhyming schemes and bold imagery of some of
his earlier works, most notably _Green Eggs and Ham_, _If I Ran the Zoo_,
and _Why Can't I Shower With Mommy?_ In this novel, Theodore Geisel,
writing under the pseudonym Dr. Seuss, pays homage to the great Dr. Sigmund
Freud in a nightmarish fantasy of a renegade feline helping two young
children understand their own frustrated sexuality.
The story opens with two youngsters, a brother and a sister, abandoned by
their mother, staring mournfully through the window of their single-family
dwelling. In the foreground, a large tree/phallic symbol dances wildly in
the wind, taunting the children and encouraging them to succumb to the
sexual yearnings they undoubtedly feel for each other. Even to the most
unlearned reader, the blatant references to the incestuous relationship the
two share set the tone for Seuss' probing examination of the satisfaction
of primitive needs. The Cat proceeds to charm the wary youths into engaging
in what he so innocently refers to as "tricks." At this point, the fish,
an obvious Christ figure who represents the prevailing Christian morality,
attempts to warn the children, and thus, in effect, warns all of humanity
of the dangers associated with the unleashing of the primal urges. In
response to this, the cat proceeds to balance the aquatic naysayer on the
end of his umbrella, essentially saying, "Down with morality; down with
God!"
After poohpoohing the righteous rantings of the waterlogged Christ figure,
the Cat begins to juggle several icons of Western culture, most notably two
books, representing the Old and New Testaments, and a saucer of lacteal
fluid, an ironic reference to maternal loss the two children experienced
when their mother abandoned them "for the afternoon." Our heroic Id adds
to this bold gesture a rake and a toy man, and thus completes the Oedipal
triangle.
Later in the novel, Seuss introduces the proverbial Pandora's box, a large
red crate out of which the Id releases Thing One, or Freud's concept of
Ego, the division of the psyche that serves as the conscious mediator
between the person and reality, and Thing Two, the Superego which functions
to reward and punish through a system of moral attitudes, conscience, and
guilt. Referring to this box, the Cat says, "Now look at this trick. Take
a look!" In this, Dr. Seuss uses the children as a brilliant metaphor for
the reader, and asks the reader to re-examine his own inner self.
The children, unable to control the Id, Ego, and Superego allow these
creatures to run free and mess up the house, or more symbolically, control
their lives. This rampage continues until the fish, or Christ symbol,
warns that the mother is returning to reinstate the Oedipal triangle that
existed before her abandonment of the children. At this point, Seuss
introduces a many-armed cleaning device which represents the psychoanalytic
couch, which proceeds to put the two youngsters' lives back in order.
With powerful simplicity, clarity, and drama, Seuss reduces Freud's
concepts on the dynamics of the human psyche to an easily understood
gesture. Mr. Seuss' poetry and choice of words is equally impressive and
serves as a splendid counterpart to his bold symbolism. In all, his
writing style is quick and fluid, making _The Cat in the Hat_ impossible to
put down. While this novel is 61 pages in length, and one can read it in
five minutes or less, it is not until after multiple readings that the
genius of this modern day master becomes apparent.
####===================================================================####
RUM CAKE
####===================================================================####
Date: Thu, 26 Dec 1991 14:55 HKT
From: "Spode, God/ess of Chaos!" <LBSPODIC%USTHK.BITNET@YALEVM.YCC.Yale.Edu>
Subject: A rum cake recipe for the post-holidays
----- Begin Included Message -----
With the holiday season upon us, I'm sure someone will wish to make a
rumcake, so herewith is the annual rumcake recipe. Those who have this on
file from last year please delete and forgive the duplication. ...
BEST EVER RUM CAKE
1 or 2 quarts Rum Baking Powder
1 cup butter 1 tsp. soda
1 tsp sugar Lemon juice
1 cup dried fruit Brown sugar
Nuts
Before you start, sample the Rum to check for quality. Good, isn't it? Now
go ahead. Select a large mixing bowl, measuring cup, etc.
Check the Rum again. It must be just right. To be sure Rum is of the
highest quality, pour 1 level cup of Rum into a glass, and drink it as fast
as you can. Repeat.
With an electricc mixer, beat 1 cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl. Add 1
seaspoon of thugar and beat again.
Meanwhile, make sure that the Rum is of the fines quality. Try another
cup. Open second Quart if necessary.
Add 2 arge leggs, 2 cups fried druit, and beat till high. If druit gets
stuck in beaters, just pry it loose with a drewscriver.
Sample the Rum again, checcking for tonscisticity.
Next sift 3 cups of pepper or salt (it really doesn't matter).
Sample the Rum again.
Sift 1/2 pint of lemon juice. Fold in chopped butter and strained nuts.
Add 1 babblespoon of brown thugar, or whatever color you can find. Wix wel.
Grease over the turn cake pan to 350 gredees. Now pour the whole mess int
the coven and ake.
Check the Rum again, and bo to ged.
####===================================================================####
SAFE FAX
####===================================================================####
Date: Thu, 26 Dec 1991 14:54 HKT
From: "Spode, God/ess of Chaos!" <LBSPODIC@USTHK.BITNET>
Subject: A guide to safe fax
From: Grant Hogarth <autodesk!claygate!grant@FERNWOOD.MPK.CA.US>
GUIDE TO SAFE FAX
Q DO I HAVE TO BE MARRIED TO HAVE SAFE FAX?
A. Although married people fax quite often, there are many
single people who fax complete strangers every day.
Q. MY PARENTS SAY THEY NEVER HAD FAX WHEN THEY WERE YOUNG AND WERE ONLY
ALLOWED TO WRITE MEMOS TO EACH OTHER UNTIL THEY WERE TWENTY-ONE.
HOW OLD DO YOU THINK SOMEONE SHOULD BE BEFORE THEY CAN FAX?
A. Faxing can be performed at any age, once you learn the correct procedure.
Q. IF I FAX SOMETHING TO MYSELF, WILL I GO BLIND?
A. Certainly not, as far as we can see.
Q. THERE IS A PLACE ON OUR STREET WHERE YOU CAN GO AND PAY FOR FAX.
IS THIS LEGAL?
A. Yes, many people have no other outlet for their fax drives and must pay
a "professional" when their needs to fax become too great.
Q. SHOULD A COVER ALWAYS BE USED FOR FAXING?
A. Unless you are really sure of the one you're faxing, a cover
sheet should be used to insure safe fax.
Q. WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I INCORRECTLY DO THE PROCEDURE AND I FAX PREMATURELY?
A. Don't panic. Many people prematurely fax when they haven't faxed in a
long time. Just start over; most people won't mind if you try again.
Q. I HAVE A PERSONAL AND BUSINESS FAX. CAN TRANSMISSIONS BECOME MIXED UP?
A. Being bi-faxual can be confusing, but as long as you use a cover with
each one, you won't transmit anything you're not supposed to.
####===================================================================####
RANDOM ACTS OF KINDNESS
####===================================================================####
From: "Spode, God/ess of Chaos!" <LBSPODIC%USTHK.BITNET@YALEVM.YCC.Yale.Edu
>Subject: Guerilla Goodness!! This is really nice - fitting for the holidays.
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1991 11:58:42 PST
From: Grant Hogarth <autodesk!claygate!grant@FERNWOOD.MPK.CA.US>
Subject: GOOD NEWS: Random Kindness and Senseless Acts of Beauty
Just when you thought the world was going down the drain for the last
time....
----- Begin Included Message ----
PRACTICE
RANDOM KINDNESS
AND
SENSELESS ACTS OF BEAUTY
It's a crisp winter day in San Francisco. A woman in a red Honda, Christmas
presents piled in the back, drives up to the Bay Bridge tollbooth. "I'm
paying for myself, and for the six cars behind me," she says with a smile,
handing over seven commuter tickets.
One after another, the next six drivers arrive at the tollbooth, dollars in
hand, only to be told, "Some lady up ahead already paid your fare. Have a
nice day."
The woman in the Honda, it turned out, had read something on an index card
taped to a friend's refrigerator: "Practice random kindness and senseless
acts of beauty." The phrase seemed to leap out at her, and she copied it
down.
Judy Foreman spotted the same phrase spray-painted on a warehouse wall a
hundred miles from her home. When it stayed on her mind for days, she gave
up and drove all the way back to copy it down. "I thought it was incredibly
beautiful," she said explaining why she's taken to writing it at the bottom
of all her letters, "like a message from above."
Her husband, Frank, liked the phrase so much that he put it up on the wall
for his seventh graders, one of whom was the daughter of a local columnist.
The columnist put it in the paper, admitting that though she liked it, she
didn't know where it came from [sic] or what it really meant.
Two days later, she heard from Anne Herbert. Tall, blonde, and forty,
Herbert lives in Marin, one of the country's ten richest counties, where
she house-sits, takes odd-jobs, and gets by. It was in a Sausalito
restaurant that Herbert jotted the phrase down on a paper place mat, after
turning it around in her mind for days.
"That's wonderful!" a man sitting nearby said, and copied it down carefully
on his own placemat.
"Here's the idea," Herbert says. "anything you think there should be more
of, do it randomly."
Her own fantasies include: (1) breaking into depressing-looking schools to
paint the classrooms, (2) leaving hot meals on kitchen tables in the poor
parts of town, (3) slipping money into a proud old woman's purse. Says
Herbert, "kindness can build on itself as much as violence can." Now the
phrase is spreading, on bumper stickers, on walls, at the bottom of letters
and business cards. And as it spreads, so does a vision of guerrilla
goodness.
In Portland, Oregon, a man might plunk a coin into a stranger's meter just
in time. In Patterson, New Jersey, a dozen people with pails and mops and
tulip bulbs might descend on a run-down house and clean it from top to
bottom while the frail elderly owners look on, dazed and smiling. In
Chicago, a teenage boy may be shoveling off the driveway when the impulse
strikes. "What the hell, nobody's looking", he thinks, and shovels the
neighbor's driveway, too.
It's positive anarchy, disorder, a sweet disturbance. A woman in Boston
writes "Merry Christmas!" to the tellers on the back of her checks. A man
in St. Louis, whose car has just been rear-ended by a young woman, waves
her away, saying, "It's a scratch. Don't Worry."
Senseless acts of beauty spread: A man plants daffodils along the roadway,
his shirt billowing in the breeze from passing cars. In Seattle, a man
appoints himself a one man vigilante sanitation service and roams the
concrete hills collecting litter in a supermarket cart. In Atlanta, a man
scrubs graffiti from a green park bench.
They say you can't smile without cheering yourself up a little -- likewise,
you can't commit a random act of kindness without feeling as if your own
troubles have been lightened if only because the world has become a
slightly better place.
And you can't be a recipient without feeling a shock, a pleasant jolt. If
you were one of those rush-hour drivers who found your bridge fare paid,
who knows what you might have been inspired to do for someone else later?
Wave someone on in the intersection? Smile at a tired clerk? Or something
larger, greater? Like all revolutions, guerrilla goodness begins slowly,
with a single act. Let it be yours.
####===================================================================####
HAL'S BIRTHDAY
####===================================================================####
Date: Sun, 12 Jan 1992 07:33:45 -0600
From: Mick Souder <MASOUDER@OA.STKATE.EDU>
Subject: HAL's birthday
Today HAL of 2001 fame is born in Urbana, Ill.
Let's all sing
Daisy, Daisy..........
####===================================================================####
VENDING MACHINES
####===================================================================####
Date: Fri, 27 Dec 1991 21:42 HKT
From: "Spode, God/ess of Chaos!" <LBSPODIC@USTHK.BITNET>
Subject: Murphy's Laws of Vending Machines
Date: Mon, 16 Dec 1991 10:52:00 EST
From: SV643146I@LIUVAX.BITNET
Subject: Joke du Jour
There are Murphy's Laws for everything, right? Well, where I go to school
there are vending machines from hell. These machines have prompted me to
come up with my own laws that govern vending machines:
STACI'S VERSION OF MURPHY'S LAWS FOR VENDING MACHINES
The Sorry-No-Change Law:
When the 'Use Exact Change Only' light is lit you will have 3
quarters for a 55 cent product.
The 'There it goes!' Law:
When you have the exact amount, you will drop a coin and helplessly
watch it roll under the machine to be lost forever.
The First Law of Wanting:
The person at the machine will take the last one of 'Just what you
wanted'.
Corollary: The machine will be refilled with nothing you wanted.
The Second Law of Wanting:
The machine with 'Just what you wanted' will be out of order.
The Law of Machine Feeding:
The machine will malfunction and eat your money.
The Law of Mis-hits:
You will hit the wrong selection and end up with 'Turnip paste
filled wheat crackers...with nuts'.
The Fizzy Law:
You will be the first to discover the soda machine has no cups.
McGill's Inverse Fragility Law:
The most delicate products in the machine will placed so as to fall
the furthest when selected to ensure being crushed into inedibility.
The So-Close-And-Yet-So-Far Law (3rd Law of Wanting):
The last product of 'Just what you wanted' will jam in the machine.
---
####===================================================================####
MORE FROM THE AMAZING WORLD OF SPODE
####===================================================================####
Date: Fri, 27 Dec 1991 21:43 HKT
From: "Spode, God/ess of Chaos!" <LBSPODIC@USTHK.BITNET>
Subject: Some miscellaneous jokes I was sent recently...
Comments: Originally-From:
"Pradeep Singh, 508-493-7246, DTN: 223-7246 26-Nov-1991 1332"
<singh@cpdw.enet.dec.com>
[forwards removed]
I heard this on _Comic Strip Live_ last night...
So they're building this tunnel between France and England.
England drives on the left side of the road.
France drives on the right side of the road.
That's going to be one busy lane!!!!
= = = = = = =
"Hit and run means never having to say you're sorry"
---
"Personal" ad in local paper: David G. Contact me soon! Bring three rings:
Engagement, wedding and teething. Have news. Debbie.
---
It's a well known fact that computing devices such as the abacus were
invented thousands of years ago. But it's not well known that the first use
of a common computer protocol occurred in the Old Testament.
This, of course, was when Moses aborted the Egyptians' process with a
control-sea...
= = = = = = =
I have truncated and I can't round up!
= = = = = = =
N O T I C E
If you notice this notice, you will notice after
noticing this notice that this notice is not worth noticing.
= = = = = = =
Garrison Keillor told this on A Prairie Home Companion this past
weekend.
Jesus, Joseph and Mary were doing chores around their home in
Nazareth when suddenly Jesus ran outside to Joseph, and asked, "Did you call
me?" "No," Joseph replied, "I just hit my thumb with the hammer."
= = = = = = =
"When you're young, you ask your father all kinds of questions because
you think he has some special kind of Dad knowledge. Later you realize
that all he really knows is how to have sex with your mother."
-- Comedian Jake Johansen
= = = = = = =
Heard on Paul Harvey News on 6/20/91:
George Bush is jogging again. He has to. Sununu has the car.
= = = = = = =
What do you get when you merge IBM and Apple
Blueberry Macs
I been moved to the orchard
370 Desktop release 7.0
mass market mainframes for the rest of us
= = = = = = =
>From a local newspaper story:
A riddle making the rounds in Cuba:
"What is a sardine?"
Answer: "A whale after thirty years of revolution."
= = = = = = =
Thought for the day:
What if there were no hypothetical situations?
Jeff Sauder Johns Hopkins University
= = = = = = =
Do you know what you call a beat-up Ragedy Andy doll lying face down
in a pile of rocks?
A Dirty Cotton Rock Sucker.
= = = = = = =
Came up with by a group of friends at dinner recently:
What is a politically correct term for men?
Vaginally disabled.
####===================================================================####
AND STILL MORE
####===================================================================####
Date: Fri, 27 Dec 1991 21:55 HKT
From: "Spode, God/ess of Chaos!" <LBSPODIC@USTHK.BITNET>
Subject: more...
South China Morning Post - 11 November 1991
_Australian brothel 'to provide training'_
CANBERRA: Australian tax authorities have told a South Australian
brothel it must provide training for employees or face taxation penalties.
The requirement, revealed yesterday by the federal opposition,
relates to a scheme which provides that employers with an annual payroll
of more than A$214,000 (HK$1.3 million) [US$167,000] must spend a
minimum of one per cent of that on training.
Opposition trade spokesman Mr. Alexander Downer said: "Naturally,
all of us are wondering what sort of training programmes the Australian
Taxation Office has in mind."
[stuff deleted]
Prostitution is illegal in most states in Australia, including South
Australia.
-Reuter-
==========
South China Morning Post - 8 November 1991
_In Brief - Rabat Tragedy_
RABAT: Ten people in Morocco were crushed to death and seven hurt
when about 2,000 families packed into a mausoleum to watch the
circumcision of their sons.
==========
South China Morning Post - 21 October 1991
_Fondler Fined_
SINGAPORE: An Australian tourist was fined S$700 (HK$3,306) [US$424]
for touching the buttocks of a stewardess on board a Singapore Airlines
flight. Arnold Victor Crawford, 29, a welder, pleaded guilty to
outraging the modesty of the 18-year-old stewardess.
########
Don't get me wrong. I fully approve of the fine. But does anyone else
think that "outraging the modesty" is a bit silly for a criminal/civil
offense to be called?
==========
South China Morning Post - 29 October 1991
_Safe Sex Service_
PARIS: First pizzas, now condoms - a Paris company has started offering home
deliveries of rubber contraceptives. SOS-Preservatifs will deliver condoms
from 4 pm to 3 am.
-Agencies-
+++++
Hmmm - does anyone remember Dr. Whoopee, from the Doonesbury comic strip?
-Spode
==========
South China Morning Post - 4 November 1991
_Anger over TV's 'sex hypnotism'_
TOKYO: A Japanese television station was flooded with calls from
angry viewers who said their daughters had fainted after being
sexually hypnotised by a late night show, the _Mainichi Daily News_
reported yesterday.
The programme featured an "adult video director" who hypnotised
nine young women by telling them to imagine their favourite sexual
positions, according to the daily.
Officials of Nippon Television Network, which broadcast the
show on Friday night, were not available for comment.
Following the show the television station's phones were jammed
with 100 calls from incensed viewers.
One man rushed to his daughter's room when he heard a noise and
found her unconscious and foaming at the mouth with her clothes in
shreds, the paper said.
"It's inexcusable to broadcast on public airways a programme
that shows obscene group hypnotism without even explaining to the
viewers the method of undoing the hypnotism," the man reportedly said.
_United Press International_
####===================================================================####
FINAL EXIT
####===================================================================####
Date: 14 Jan 92 00:13:00 EST
From: "MICHAEL S DOW" <DOW@vax001.kenyon.edu>
Subject: With a brief preface, you can chop these bits up and put them into
Purps. Frankly, they are too long to run all together, I think.
[Other two parts in a later Purps. This one is getting a tad big.]
About two years ago, I was attempting to get submissions for a
magazine called the Owl Creek Journal on the subject of death. In attempt
to generate interest, I placed ads which read in part "Kill Your Roommate,
and then write us about it." This was, of course, a joke. Some people,
however, were offended. They contended that not only was the joke offensive
in particular because it wasn't very good (you decide for yourself) but
also in general, that jokes about death were tasteless, because death is a
very serious and traumatic subject and therefore should not be taken
lightly. My response, then as now, was: Bullshit. Death is a very grim,
serious, dare I say morbid?, subject. It is also an inevitable part of
every life. As Jim Morrisson put it, "No one here gets out alive." All
the more reason, in my opinion, to make jokes about it. I say this now,
because I'm sure that someone will be very upset by the following joke.
I'm sure that OTISians can take this in stride, but for those of you who
aren't, I'm not sorry I made these jokes and you'll just have to deal with
them.
-Grinnin Foole
Many of you have no doubt noticed the great commotion surrounding
the new book, FINAL EXIT, a practical guide to suicide for the terminally
ill. It has raised a storm of controversy over many legal and moral
issues. I, however, am dissatisfied with the book for an entirely
different reason; namely, it does not address the needs of the truly
desperate and hopeless, the ones who REALLY need, and are desperately look
for, a FINAL EXIT, TOO:
Imagine that are forced by a horrible disease to come out only at
night, to avoid the sun because even a few minutes exposure can kill you.
Imagine that you may even have to regularly bury yourself for your own
safety. Imagine further that this horrible illness completely destroys
your appetite, and you must get all nourishment from some rather impromptu
blood transfusions. Imagine that this disease so transforms you that you
are cut off from all friends and loved ones. Imagine, worst of all, that
even the simplest statement on your part causes others to burst into
uncontrollable laughter, because you have these damn four inch fangs which
make you sound ridiculous. Imagine, in short, that you are a vampire (or
"wehmpire" as you so amusingly put it.) A merciful chance to end it all
with a little "hooman digni-ee"(as you persist in saying it) and compassion
must seem a god-send. The practical details, however, are a bit tricky.
Practically speaking, there are three options open to you:
immolation, either in a large fire or full daylight, immersion in running
water, or staking yourself. Of these options, staking yourself is the
worst. Driving a stake through your own heart can be a very painful and
traumatic experience in its own right, and since you will only be "dead" so
long as the stake remains in place (and anyone who has seen those old
Dracula movies knows that sooner or later someone WILL remove it, if only
to get your by-then-a-valuable-antique Grateful Dead t-shirt.) Staking
yourself is too hellish an experience to want to go through more than once
(although you vampire types are supposed to be into really symbolic
sex/violence stuff like that.)
The large fire/blazing sunlight options are also worth avoiding.
Few people mention it (at least, not in polite company), but vampire bien
cuite really smells revolting. Plus, if you think staking yourself hurts,
it's nothing compared to STEAKING yourself. The best option is running
water. You just painlessly dissolve away into nothingness, rather a
similar sensation to the Roman custom of slitting one's wrists in the bath.
In fact, all you need is a good shower. Note, however, that you will leave
a distinct "ring" around the tub, so have plenty of cleanser on hand.
Also, try and melt yourself in an area with good sewage treatment plants.
####===================================================================####
AND STILL MORE FROM THE LAND OF SPODE
####===================================================================####
Date: Fri, 27 Dec 1991 22:00 HKT
From: "Spode, God/ess of Chaos!" <LBSPODIC@USTHK.BITNET>
Subject: last bit for the day...
Merry Christmas!:
_Lai See_ - South China Morning Post - 10 December 1991
_Red-hooded male seeks partners for travel and fun__
The Wan Chai office of law firm Hughes-Castell has been asked
by an anonymous North Pole businessman to do some recruitment.
The lawyers have obediently taken out the following ad in
the _Law Gazette_:
- Our Client, a larger-than-life, jolly, red-clad entrepreneur,
constantly in breach of international air space law, requires
assistants to help in the following areas:
- Insurance: A specialist is required to sort out collision
claims between Concorde and four reindeer.
- Construction: Strong negotiation skills required to effect
settlements with irate homeowners over damage to roofs and chimneys.
- Partner Designate: A fine balancing act. Requires ability to
sit at the top of the tree in an attractive tutu with a fixed smile.
- Locum Position: For holiday season only, based in Lapland.
Multi-lingual assistant to carry out a mixed bag. Must have an
affinity with children and the ability to decipher difficult
instructions.
- Finance: To negotiate terms of major new sleighport and
associated projects. Able to talk turkey. Specific experience
in grotto financing an advantage.
- Employment: To deal with unseasonable dismissals in relation
to sexual harassment under the mistletoe.
- Conveyancer: To convey glad tidings of great joy.
*********************************************************************
_Lai See_ - South China Morning Post - 13 December 1991
_Santa's Clause_
Remember that joke ad featured on this page on Tuesday in which
Hongkong firm Hughes-Castell advertised for lawyers to help an
overweight "red-clad entrepreneur" over reindeer collision problems?
"Several of the quicker members of the legal community have
actually rung up to inquire about the positions," said the firm's
Pia Dolan yesterday.
"We have had to explain that we were joking."
She could not help poking fun at local legal bigwigs: "In case
the Law Society starts checking our qualifications, we are not
lawyers. We are legal recruitment consultants.
"However, I haven't checked the roll recently and we may have
been admitted accidentally."
=================
=================
South China Morning Post - 3 December 1991
_Santa Attacked_
WELLINGTON: Children kicked and swore at Santa Claus when he ran out of
sweets and balloons, New Zealand's _Northern Advocate_ newspaper reported.
A red-suited Mr. John Field said some adults also became rude and
aggressive, asking: "Is this another government cut?" The Northland
region, where the incident took place, has the country's highest
unemployment rate.
=================
and now - having nothing whatever to do with Christmas...
South China Morning Post - 18 October 1991
_Squirrel Attack_
SACRAMENTO: A California man who hit his wife on the head with frozen
squirrels was jailed on suspicion of spousal abuse. The wife of Kao
Khae Saephan, 26, suffered a gash above her eye.
####===================================================================####
CHUTZPAH
####===================================================================####
[Boy everyone is doing the NOTW bit these days. I still have some more
original NOTW bits from the Original NOTW person who hopefully by next Fall
will be back on line somewhere. It seems that many alert OTISians are
discovering the world is a truely weird place. Please keep sending these
things along. They seem to be very popular.]
Date: 16 Dec 91 00:05:00 EST
From: "ANNALISA M VANHOOK" <VANHOOK@vax001.kenyon.edu>
Subject: chutzpah
Mal-
Greetings and such. Here are some wonderful News of the Weird tidbits for you.
My source is a Knoxville (TN) 'alternative-type-underground'-arts-n-
entertainment publication. And it even comes from a section of the paper
called, brace yourself......"News of the Weird."
In May in Jacksonville, FL, a man tried to rob Charlie's Supermarket
wearing a paper bag over his head to disguise his identity. However, the
bag shifted, moving the eye holes, and in his nervousness he told the
clerk, "Give me the register." The clerk sought clarification of the
instructions, but the robber's voice was muffled because the mouth hole had
also moved. The robber attempted to create another mouth hole, but the bag
broke. The robber was revealed to be a regular customer whom the clerk
knew as "Bob." Bob fled and has not been captured. The clerk could not be
sure whether Bob had a gun or not because Bob had a paper bag over his
hand, too.
In June, Jim Black, 51, whose van was hit broadside by a speeding car in
Chicago and rolled over, survived the crash but found himself hanging
upside-down, suspended by his seatbelt. That's when he saw an arm reach
through the window and take his wallet.
In January, Jack McMorrow, 47, stopped by the offices of the Barberton, OH,
police department to inquire whether there were any outstanding warrants
for his arrest. An officer ran a check, discovered two, and promptly
arrested McMorrow.
Brain Siegle, 18, shot himself in the left shoulder with a .22 caliber
pistol in Newark, OH, in July. At first he told investigating police he
was the victim of a drive-by shooting, but later admitted that he had
inflicted the gunshot wound himself because he "wanted to see how it felt."
Isn't it comforting to know that there are people incompetent enough to do
such ridiculously stoooooopid things?
hail Otis!
hail Lotus!
hail Rotus!
hail Spode!
hail Archbishop Chad!
-St. Annalisa, Saint of Tetris
####===================================================================####
GOOD GRIEF STILL MORE!
####===================================================================####
Date: Wed, 11 Dec 1991 22:27 HKT
From: "Spode, God/ess of Chaos!" <LBSPODIC@USTHK.BITNET>
Subject: more! more! more!
South China Morning Post - 8 October 1991
_In Brief_
How to succeed in the acting business without really trying? Here's a
little tip from Sylvester Stallone: Be creative on your resume. "That's very
important; you must lie," the actor told a group of drama students at the
University of Virginia in Charlottesville.
+++++++++++++++++++++
_Newsweek_ - 21 October 1991 - p.9
_Overheard_
"What, not more? Too Bad."
-Franz Wilhelm Schmidt of Bremerhaven, Germany, upon
being told that Hitler's concentration camps
exterminated some 500,000 Gypsies.
+++++++++++++++++++++
From: Barry Gorman <GORMAN_B@UK.AC.LANCSP.P1>
Subject: Parrot story from today's paper
To: manohar kanuri <MPKANURI@SUVM.BITNET>
The Guardian Tuesday October 1st
---------------------------
This dead parrot is difunto
---------------------------
John Hooper in Madrid
---------------------------
A question left hanging by John Cleese - what is the value of a dead
parrot? - has finally been answered by a Barcelona judge. His honour
Antonio Nun^io de la Rosa has ruled that a dead parrot is worth 150,000
pesetas (815 pounds). He was awarding damages to Maria del Carmen Dotras,
whose parrot (male, green) died, passed away, turned moribund, ceased to
exist and, in short, became defunct two years ago in the city's Vall
d'Hebron hospital.
Ms dotras, who lives with her mother, had owned the bird for 23 years,
since she was 12. Her family doctor suspected the parrot might be the cause
of an allergy her mother had developed. He wanted it to have a blood test,
and told her it would be better done by a doctor that a vet. This proved
not to be the case.
According to Ms Dotras, the doctors virtually suffocated the bird by
putting a towel over its head, and took out six times as much blood as they
were told to. Eventually, a consultant ordered it to be put out of its
misery. Ms Dotras put the dead bird in the freezer, to facilitate an
autopsy. In fact, the deep freezing made it impossible to determine the
cause of death.
But, as Judge Nun^io de la Rosa observed in judgement - passages which
might have come from a Monty Python script: "The parrot has deceased, and
cannot be revived." He decided the hospital authorities and the doctor
responsible should pay the sum equivalent to a new bird. He dismissed Ms
Dotras claim for damages of one million pesetas. This had been based, in
part, on the argument that her parrot could talk.
Drawing a fine distinction that will be of assistance in future, similar
cases, the judge ruled that it merely "articulated sounds similar to those
of people." If the parrot had been able to talk, he reasoned, "it would
have complained".
+++++++++++++++++++++
_Lai See_ - South China Morning Post - 19 November 1991
_Tape-maker has latest export wrapped up_
Builders in Hongkong have ordered more than 120 kilometres of
wrapping tape from Arnhold and Co., the territory's distributor of
super-strong Denso tape.
Is it to wrap a corporate Christmas gift for us?
No. The tape will be used in Hongkong's wonderfully named Effluent
Export Scheme.
This is a welcome wheeze to send millions of gallons of Hongkong
sewage away from urban areas through a giant pipe.
The pipe will be wrapped in $1.8 million [US$231,000] worth of
UK-made Denso tape by contractors Franki Kier.
One would think that the tape would be needed to keep the noxious
substances in the pipe.
But in fact the seabed around Hongkong is so polluted that the tape
is needed to protect the pipe and its contents from "highly toxic
chemicals in the soil", according to Arnhold.
[remainder deleted]
+++++++++++++++++++++
Reading for your breathing exercises? Alright, now Inhale! Gag! Inhale!
####===================================================================####
A RUMOR OF DEAD STATESMEN
####===================================================================####
Date: Sat, 11 Jan 1992 10:53:54 EST
Reply-To: "Mass comm. and new technologies" <MASSCOMM@RPIECS.BITNET>
From: Elliott Parker <3ZLUFUR@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU>
Subject: Risk of speedy communications
From Risks Forum, 10 Jan 92:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 10 Jan 92 9:33:56 PST
From: "Peter G. Neumann" <neumann@csl.sri.com>
Subject: CNN Nearly Reported Bush Death, due to rapidly shared computer data
The AP reported from Atlanta 09Jan91 that CNN Headline News came within
seconds of reporting that President Bush had died at the banquet in Japan at
which he had collapsed from stomach flu on 8Jan92. A caller identifying
himself as Bush's doctor had telephoned CNN about three hours after Bush's
collapse, and said the president was dead.
CNN and Headline News are two floors apart but use the same newsroom
computer system. A staff member had typed the telephoned report into the
computer. CNN executives had determined almost immediately that the report was
a fake and pulled it from the computer file. But downstairs at Headline News,
it had already been seen on the screen and was nearly broadcast. CNN Headline
News anchorman Don Harrison started to read the report on the air at 9:45 a.m.
EST during coverage of Bush's collapse, when he was alerted in midsentence by
another staff member, said CNN spokesman Steve Haworth.
The alleged caller, James Edward Smith, 71, left his number with CNN and was
traced to Idaho, where he was arrested and later put in a mental hospital.
[Starkly abridged by PGN]
####===================================================================####
STUMPY SPEAKS
####===================================================================####
[Yes that little mystical brown bear is still at it. She's alive and well
and still pregnant with child. Just we here at SBI have been neglecting our
duties towards here fiercely, which could explain our computer problems.]
From: MAL@socpsy.sci.fau.edu
Date: 11 Dec 91 13:48:43 EDT
Subject: Stumpy's Xmas safety tip.
Stumpy has revealed to me today that it's VERY important to orient the star
at the top of your Christmas tree correctly. Usually the Star contains
metal which is effected by the earth's magnetic field. If this star is
oriented wrong the magnetic field will cause the tree to tip over because
of the magnetic pull.
In order to fix this problem, you need to orient the star so the narrowest
portion of it faces toward magnetic north. Not true north, but magnetic.
You'll need a compass to do this. By facing the narrowest side not the star
will essentially become "streamlined" in the magnetic field and thus be
less likely to be influenced by it.
####===================================================================####
SCIENCE FACTS
####===================================================================####
[More stuff from an amazingly fertile mind.]
Date: Sun, 15 Dec 91 14:54:53 EST
From: eap@eta.pha.jhu.edu (Ed Pier)
Ed's Fun Science Fact #1
Everyone has heard of the Tibetan monks who through years of practice
learn to double-stop, that is sing two notes at once, but very few have
heard of a more obscure group who achieve enlightenment by humming in a
different way. These monks live austere lives rarely moving, eating only
enough to sustain themselves and humming continuously stopping only to draw
in breath or nourishment. The purpose of this seemingly strange behavior is
to practice singing the exact resonant frequency of one's own head. Those
who have found the resonating frequency of rooms or small containers may
find it odd that these monks need to devote their lives to what seems a
simple task, however it is an exact resonance that these monks seek to
achieve, accurate to the last decimal place. This is no minor achievement.
After years of devotion, often doing without sleep for weeks at a time in
their quest for the perfect note, sometimes passing through the correct
several times before it can be sustained long enough, the moment arrives
when the resonant vibrations within a monk's head grow stronger and
stronger until at the climactic moment his head explodes and he passes into
enlightenment. People who wish to join the order are given the task of
carrying food and cleaning up.
Ed's fun Science Fact #2
Galeleo was the first man to turn a telescope skyward and discover that the
heavens had blemishes. The Moon's face was cratered with acne, Saturn had
jug handles (later determined to be the ring which we associate the planet
with today) and the giant planet Jupiter was attended by for smaller
objects buzzing around its head (the four largest "Galelean" moons of that
planet) and there, on its face was a tiny smudge. As the science of
astronomy progressed this smudge turned out not to be tiny at all but a
swirling maelstrom large enough to swallow several earths. This permanent
weather formation quickly became known as The Great Red Spot. As the first
Voyager space-craft made its pass by Jupiter thrilling scientists with its
close-up photographs of the the angry eye of the Great Red Spot, nature
lovers in the northern parts of the United States were treated with a more
familiar beauty - that of the yearly Autumn foliage. It is strange to think
that such widely separated and wildly different phenomena could be in any
way related, but this in fact they are.
A tree's photosynthetic factories are no longer an asset in the winter
when cold temperature would badly damage such a delicate and exposed thing
as a leaf, therefore as the cold months approach, a barrier forms across
the tiny capillaries which supply the leaves with nutrients from the roots
and the leaves slowly begin to die. First the green chlorophyll, no longer
needed, fades to reveal the yellow carotine which it has masked all summer.
Then, left on its own, chemically strange things begin to happen in the
leaf. The sugars which heretofore stored energy and nourished the cells
begin to transform into a variety of organic compounds which together form
the striking red colors typical of Acer sucrum, the sugar maple.
Now the striking fact discovered by the spectroscopes aboard the
Voyager spacecraft is that the organic pigments which make up the menacing
red of Jupiter's Great Red Spot are just the same as the ones cooked up
within our terrestrial leaves every Autumn
Ed's fun science fact #3
Everyone has heard that moss grows on the north side of trees.
Theoretically, this makes perfect sense, as in the northern temperate zone
the sun is always to the south, and moss would prefer the cooler, moister,
shaded, northern side of a tree to the direct sunlight on the to the south.
In reality there are many other factors, such as the shade of other nearby
trees, which make this bit of wisdom nearly useless as a direction
indicator. If Hariet Tubman and other slaves escaping to freedom before the
Civil War would surely have become hopelessly lost if they did not have
other ways to sense direction.
Most people have also heard of the protozoans which only swim to the
north. Their single cells contain minute iron filings which align the
microscopic creatur
es' bodies with the earth's magnetic field. A would-be
biological circus trainer could cause them to dance about a microscope
slide to his will by simply waving a magnet. The reason that these
microbial Hariet Tubman proteges have such an internal compass is that the
desire the same conditions as the fabled north-seeking moss. In the
northern hemisphere the earth's magnetic field lines slant downwards
meeting each other at the center of the earth, converging along the north
magnetic pole. It is not north that these protozoans are seeking, but the
dark comfort of muddy pond bottoms.
Even without a microscope or a mossy tree at hand many people are
quite confident of their sense of direction. Indeed when people are placed
in a featureless room, devoid of direction cues from the sun or terrain,
they are able to correctly identify which way is north a statistically
significant number of times. Startlingly it turns out that people, just
like those distant microscopic cousins, have compasses in their noses. Tiny
pieces of iron detect the earth's magnetic field and give people a vague
sense of north. As Ms. Tubman sought safety in the northern free states,
tiny protozoans seek safety in pond bottoms, both using much the same
internal mechanism.
####===================================================================####
THE ARCHBISHOP SPEAKS
####===================================================================####
Date: 10 Jan 92 11:32:00 EST
From: Wombat <HILLV@vax001.kenyon.edu>
Subject: material
Dunno what you might use this for exactly, but call it a submission. From
the arch-bishop to the wombat.
From: VAX001::HESSOUN "Rational romantic mystic cynical idealist" 16-DEC
-1991 23:28:18.50
To: VAX001::HILLV
CC:
Subj: FRAUD?!?!?!
When are you not on this infernal machine? Every time I log on, HILLV is on
the user list. GET A LIFE!!!
As for this obviously herectical statement about OTIS, take it up with the
deacon of cluelessness. I mean, what do you want? OTIS Light to go with
your Catholic Light? OTIS is non-fat, low-cal, low cholesterol, low sodium,
religion at its finest. In fact, those California health nuts are jumping
all over it. Don't miss you chance to jump on the band wagon!! Join Now!!
Renew Your Vows!! It's never too late to come back!!
OTIS SAVES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(Just ask the Pope, Jeffe I)
Incidentally, we're thinking of throwing that expatriate Pope a party for
his birthday, towards the beginning of that second month of the year.
Bless you my child. [that'll be $19.95 at the window for your official
archbishop's blessing. thank you, and stop by again sometime. Thank you for
your support, or lack thereof.]
-cHAD
####===================================================================####
JIGSAW NIGHT PART III
####===================================================================####
[Don't worry. This *is* part III. It's got the work Jigsaw in the title
after all.]
FROM: Pope Jephe I
Jigsaw in the Night, Part 3
The four watched in silence as the corpse tumbled out of the third story
window to land with a dull crunch in the dust. The action was followed by a
flurry of automatic fire, nowhere near where they had bedded themselves
down.
"WARNING," called a voice in loud, clear, unpunctuated English a few
moments later.
"It's not," said Keith Baxter to the solider beside him, " really Company
policy to get involved in disputes of this sort."
It was like that awful joke: what's black and white and red all over...
"You're more than welcome to watch from a safe distance. Just please wait
with us until reinforcements arrive."
Another solider who had been talking into a handheld radio put it down and
said something in Hebrew.
A newspaper? No, a nun falling down the stairs.
"Make that wait here. Intifada riots in the city, we've been told to solve
this on our own." A curt response in Hebrew.
Or a monk in a monastery somewhere in what used to be Palestine, shot in
the head by someone who still considered himself a Palestinian because his
brothers decided to harboring an Israeli solider wounded in a local fight,
and, less forgivable, consciously denying aid to a Palestinian civilian.
So here he sat, did Baxter, an Agency field operative ("join the CIA and
travel to distant and dreary hellholes of the universe, meet sick twisted
angry sons of bitches and die or kill for them before they kill you,
depending on fluctuating US policy"), in the middle of the West Bank, with
two IDF soldiers (one Jewish, one Druze), someone who he assumed was
Mossad, and someone else he didn't' particularly want to know who was He
had (hadn't you. Baxter ol' boy?) been swapping intelligence techniques in
a demented sort of "classroom laboratory", until, that is they'd run in to
this little pickle. A fine mess, indeed, though Baxter, but why then, oh
Baxter are you smiling.
"You didn't," said Keith Baxter, "let me finish. Look there are four of us
here, and as far as we can guess, only three in there. Heavily armed, I'll
grant you, but probably acting on their own, hardly organized PLO material
they or following organized PLO policy... In short, gentlemen. we have a
chance. Come at them three in the front (spread out a little), and one from
the back (me), as the front three draw fire. With any luck, I'll be able to
bump 'em off. If not, I'll smoke 'em out. Gentlemen, I see a promotion in
this for all of us. Sound good?"
"Then cover me," said Keith Baxter and was on the move almost before the
bullets started.
First floor, underwear, socks, garters, women's undergarments, unprepared
weenie keeping the rear guarded. Guarding the rear, good idea, putting
someone competent here, would have been a better idea. Definitely not
professionals. Now the where'd I put that knife?
Second floor, sporting goods, dying monk (tried to garrote the invaders
with his thrice knitted belt, perhaps), leatherware, and...noo badies.
A close report, and something whizzed by Baxter's ear. Baxter dropped and
rolled and got off a good shot up the stairs and through the open door.
Correction: One baddie, almost one lucky baddie. And now they know I'm
coming. Baxter leapt up the stairs. Third floor (smoke grenade, hit the
ground), raincoats, household appliance, angry, tearful Palestinian (mark
where he is, look like they hit this one in the arm, doge his fire),
several hostage monks reconsiderer the Palestinian problem, can you really
expect people to be nice when you take away their country (fire, fire,
fire, at what we hope is still a gunman and not a monk)? Missed.
Not so fast, you are Baxter's promotion, Bozo, his key to a desk job, his
gold star. Oooph! Fists, huh? Why not give up? You're beat. Ooph. James
makes this look so easy in the films. All right, no more mister nice CIA
operative. One: that $1.99 bandanna is obviously shielding you from the
teargas almost as well as my IDF issue mask. It goes. Success! Two: I don't
like fighting on equal term, but (ooph! less cockiness, Baxter, more
action)... Crack! Well, to hell with it, there goes one of your ribs.
Three: Ah. No need for steps three and four.
Jesus, thinks an exhausted Baxter smiling through the yellow fog at
teary-eyed Monks, I had better get my damn promotion.
####===================================================================####
MORE WEIRD NEWS
####===================================================================####
[Note: these were submitted to us by mail. These are taking out of a
regular old newspaper. Alert OTIS Shark has been prowling the papers
looking for neat stuff for us.]
From: Shark@csd4.csd.uwm.edu
Death Ruled accident
Bakersfield, Calif. --AP-- the death of a tourist crushed by a windblown
umbrella from a display set up by artist Christo was formally ruled an
accident by the Kern Country coroner's office. Lorie Keevil-Mathews, 33,
was killed when wind uprooted a 20-foot umbrella in Tejon Pass, where the
Bulgarian artist Christo had unfurled 1,760 yellow umbrellas.
Charges dropped in case of missing videotape
----
Reno, Nev. --AP-- Charges were dropped against a woman arrested for
allegedly failing to return a rented movie videotape.
"I didn't want to go this far with this, but I as prepared to go to trial,
" Noelle Lester said tuesday. "I had witnesses lined up.'
Lest was arrested after a deputy pulled her over for a burned-out
headlight. A check revealed an outstanding warrant for failing to return a
video tape rented two years ago.
"I had to lave my children on the side of the road with a sheriff's deputy
while the other one took me to jail. That hurt," she said.
She said the was never told about the arrest, and insisted that she had
rented the tape.
Lest was notified Tuesday by the District Attorney's Office that the charges
had been dropped.
####===================================================================####
THEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHEENDTHE
####===================================================================####
