The soldier came knocking upon the queen's door He said, "I am not fighting for you anymore" The queen knew she had seen his face someplace before And slowly she let him inside. He said, "I see you now, and you're so very young But I've seen more battles lost than I have battles won And I have this intuition that it's all for your fun And now will you tell me why?" -- Suzanne Vega, "The Queen and The Soldier"
Who is W.O. Baker, and why is he saying those terrible things about me?
...eighty years later he could still recall with the young pang of his original joy his falling in love with Ada. -- Nabokov
Desist from enumerating your fowl prior to their emergence from the shell.
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?"
There was once a programmer who was attached to the court of the warlord Wu. The warlord asked the programmer: "Which is easier to design: an accounting package or an operating system?" "An operating system," replied the programmer. The warlord uttered an exclamation of disbelief. "Surely an accounting package is trivial next to the complexity of an operating system," he said. "Not so," said the programmer, "when designing an accounting package, the programmer operates as a mediator between people having different ideas: how it must operate, how its reports must appear, and how it must conform to tax laws. By contrast, an operating system is not limited by outward appearances. When designing an operating system, the programmer seeks the simplest harmony between machine and ideas. This is why an operating system is easier to design." The warlord of Wu nodded and smiled. "That is all good and well," he said, "but which is easier to debug?" The programmer made no reply. -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"
Where the hell is Wall Drug?
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
If you look good and dress well, you don't need a purpose in life. -- Robert Pante, fashion consultant
After his Ignoble Disgrace, Satan was being expelled from Heaven. As he passed through the Gates, he paused a moment in thought, and turned to God and said, "A new creature called Man, I hear, is soon to be created." "This is true," He replied. "He will need laws," said the Demon slyly. "What! You, his appointed Enemy for all Time! You ask for the right to make his laws?" "Oh, no!" Satan replied, "I ask only that he be allowed to make his own." It was so granted. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
If Love Were Oil, I'd Be About A Quart Low -- Book title by Lewis Grizzard
In war it is not men, but the man who counts. -- Napoleon
QOTD: "All I want is a little more than I'll ever get."
I have never understood this liking for war. It panders to instincts already catered for within the scope of any respectable domestic establishment. -- Alan Bennett
The cost of feathers has risen, even down is up!
Keep on keepin' on.
Absence is to love what wind is to fire. It extinguishes the small, it enkindles the great.
It's faster horses, Younger women, Older whiskey and More money. -- Tom T. Hall, "The Secret of Life"
...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
Machines that have broken down will work perfectly when the repairman arrives.