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Yucks Digest V1 #106
Yucks Digest Mon, 2 Dec 91 Volume 1 : Issue 106
Today's Topics:
Belgian UFO
Car for sale to good home
From Henry's Joke List
FW: New Twisted Tune On KISW
Has Portfolio, Will Travel
Huh?
long, lost answer
Really Tasteless Practical Joke
Somthing Heading this way.
Tasteless things seen on T.V. II
unix PIDs
What are the lawyers doing to the computer industry?
The "Yucks" digest is a moderated list of the bizarre, the unusual, the
possibly insane, and the (usually) humorous. It is issued on a
semi-regular basis, as the whim and time present themselves.
Back issues may be ftp'd from arthur.cs.purdue.edu from
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 26 Nov 91 17:30:00 GMT
From: Michael.Corbin@p0.f428.n104.z1.FIDONET.ORG (Michael Corbin)
Subject: Belgian UFO
Newsgroups: alt.alien.visitors
* Forwarded from "ParaNet UFO Echo"
* Originally from Michael Corbin
* Originally dated 11-24-91 23:25
The following report has been provided by Jean Manfroid of the Liege University
and the Institute of Astrophysics. Mr. Manfroid is a subscriber to the ParaNet
digest on Internet.
SCIENTISTS OF THE ASTROPHYSICAL INSTITUTE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF
LIEGE COMMUNICATE THE FOLLOWING REPORT ON THE SOBEPS BOOK
ABOUT BELGIAN UFOS, AND AGREE TO HAVE IT DISTRIBUTED VIA PARANET.
Belgian UFOs
SOBEPS, a Belgian association of UFO buffs has compiled and
published a series of accounts of UFO sightings in the Liege
area. The title is "The UFO wave over Belgium" (in French), and
it is now a top selling book here. The preface is by the French
CNRS scientist Petit, well-known for the fact that his scientific
inspiration is due to aliens (coming from planet UMMO, 15 light
years from us, as you should know). Coincidentally, Dr Petit and
others are publishing at the same time books on the UMMITs.
[...remainder deleted.
How many of the rest of you knew that plane UMMO is 15 light years
away from us? An a source of inspiration, at that! --spaf]
------------------------------
Date: 30 Nov 91 20:54:16 GMT
From: spaf
Subject: Car for sale to good home -- TRUE
Newsgroups: purdue.forsale,in.misc
It had to happen sometime. My green monster is for sale -- I sort of
hate to part with it, but I've been made an offer I can't refuse on a
newer car. So, here's *your* chance to own a legend -- a car
instantly recognized by hundreds (if not thousands) of colleagues,
former students, fan-club members, and other motorists jealous of an
automobile of real substance.
The car in question is a dark-green 1975 Olds Cutlass Supreme hardtop.
It shows its age in spots -- some rust, dings, and the vinyl top looks
like it has leprosy. However, looks are deceiving -- this car runs
great and is *very* dependable (I've had it nearly 11 years). The
interior has undergone some wear, but this just adds to its historical
value.
Features of interest:
* 350 V-8 in great condition (uses NO oil between changes)
* tune-up & carb rebuild within last 1500 miles
* transmission overhaul within last 5000 miles
* 1-year-old top-of-line DieHard battery
* brand-new exhaust system from the catalytic converter back
* good tires
* costs about $30 a year to register in Indiana!
The car is a 2-door, with power steering and power brakes (disc front,
drum rear). Automatic transmission. AM/FM radio. A/C (needs
recharge). More steel in the body than two Hyundais put together --
Detroit doesn't make them this solid anymore (except, perhaps, for the
M1A Abrams -- but the SpafMobile doesn't have a cannon or reactive
armor, either).
I've babied this car (mechanically, at least), and with reasonable
care, it could last at least 50K more miles. Abuse the heck out of it
and it *still* may be good for 50K+ more miles -- this is a solid car.
The SpafMobile also has some interesting symbolic value -- I doubt if
there are too many other cars around that have had as passengers:
* Steve Johnson (formerly of Bell Labs & Stardent)
* Dennis Ritchie (yes, him)
* Andy Tanenbaum (the one in Amsterdam)
* Rob Kolstad (he laughed at it, but accepted the ride anyhow)
* almost every ICS PhD student at Georgia Tech from 1981 thru 1986
* me and members of my family, including the cats :-)
* many other discerning and self-confident individuals who laugh
(or at least giggle nervously) in the face of danger and/or
springs poking through the upholstery
I'm willing to entertain any reasonable offers for this classic rather
than sell it for parts. Call x4-7825 to see the car and make an
offer. Best reasonable offer by about December 12 gets it, or the car
gets sold for parts (sob!).
The "SPAF" license plate does NOT go with the sale! :-)
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1991 17:24:04 PST
From: Cate3.osbu_north@xerox.com
Subject: From Henry's Joke List
To: spaf
Steve Boswell | This opinion is distributed in the hopes that it
whatis@ucsd.edu | will be useful, but without any warranty...
When I was in 1st grade I remember reading a vitamin bottle: "For
children under 4 years old and children 4 years old or over."
That I should be introduced to the pervasive stupidity of the world
at such an early age...
My kindergarten teacher also didn't know if the "US" on mailboxes
stood for "United States" or "us", as in "our mail"...
------------------------------
Date: Mon Dec 2 07:57:08 1991
From: ingate!ericl@cac.washington.edu
Subject: FW: New Twisted Tune On KISW
To: andyst barbstal billfe bobr carlt chrisdr chrisno craigfl
Compliments of KISW's (FM 99.9, Seattle) morning program, Twisted Radio.
You know Hitler and Ceasar and Agnew and Nixon
Stalin and Lenin and David The Klansman
But do you recall..
The most famous politician of all?
Teddy the Red-Nosed Senator
Had a very shiny car
and if you ever saw it
you were probably near a bar
All of the other Senators
Wondered how he got his dames
They thought he drank too many
To play in any bedroom games
Then one foggy Christmas Eve
Santa came to say
"Teddy with your nose so red
Won't you help me guide my sled"
That's how the police found them
Wrapped around a maple tree
Teddy the Red-Nosed Senator
He's a drunken S.O.B.
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 2 Dec 91 11:44:10 PST
From: one of our correspondents
Subject: Has Portfolio, Will Travel
To: yucks-request
WASHINGTON (AP)
Your shipment of widgets is languishing in the steamy heat of a
tropical port, bogged down in bureaucratic inertia. The local contact
you hired to cut through the red tape isn't returning your phone
calls.
A personal diplomat would be nice right about now.
No problem, say Charles Schmitz, 53, and Ashley Hewitt, 59, two
diplomats-turned-businessmen who offer just that kind of service
through their fledgling Global Business Access Ltd.
Global, which is like a diplomatic "temp" service, matches
companies and their overseas problems with former foreign service and
intelligence officers having the required expertise.
The idea is simple said Schmitz: Link scores of former government
overseas experts scattered around the country and overseas via
computer and fax machine to a small central office in downtown
Washington where their talents can be farmed out on a temporary basis
to businesses.
For fees ranging from under $1,000-a-day to $2,400-a-day, Global
associates will research potential overseas markets for a company's
products, put it in touch with local movers and shakers, or teach a
firm's foreign-bound personnel how to avoid everything from social
gaffes to kidnappings.
"We joke in our firm that we have this relationship where we can
rent an ambassador and we're doing just that. And it's working out
extremely well," said Snelling Brainard, head of Consolidated Seafood
Corp., a Boston-based company that sells custom-made fishing fleets
using automated hook-baiting equipment to developing countries.
Through Global associates Brainard said he has made potential
sales contacts in the western Pacific, Morocco, and several South
American countries.
In fact, Global has an existing pool of more than 80 experts on
high technology, agriculture, trade promotion and terrorism. Its
associates are fluent in a wide range of languages.
Their ranks include former ambassadors, deputy ambassadors, trade
negotiators, technology attaches even a former CIA station chief.
"We're not just pretty faces in striped pants," said Hewitt, a
32-year Foreign Service veteran who lived and worked in Latin America
and served on the staff of Henry Kissinger when he was a national
security adviser.
Schmitz, a Yale-educated lawyer who worked on the Panama Canal
treaty and other sensitive missions during his decades in the Foreign
Service, says Global is recycling "an asset created by the taxpayers."
The Foreign Service Act's "up or out" policy gives U.S. diplomats
20 years to make ambassadorial rank or retire. But the closer to the
top one rises, the fewer jobs there are, making for a lot of
relatively young Foreign Service retirees.
Since starting in March, Global has been linking that talent with
mostly small or new businesses 15 so far that can't afford to send
their own personnel overseas.
They took on Christopher Chapin, a veteran management consultant
and the firm's only non-government retiree. Chapin advises them on
business matters and is in the process of setting up a business
center in Mexico City where state government representatives can rent
space, equipment and experts.
But Global's main asset is its talent.
For instance, if you're a small U.S. company in need of somebody
who speaks French, knows his or her way around West Africa and has
expertise in energy issues or international trade, Global will find
you someone to help, said Schmitz a soft-spoken, intense man who once
served as senior adviser to U.S. ambassador to the UN.
With the upcoming economic union of Europe, growing competition
from the Pacific Rim and new markets emerging from behind the
shattered Iron Curtain, American businesses will need all the help
they can get.
------------------------------
Date: 28 Nov 91 15:07:39 GMT
From: cebarton@descartes.waterloo.edu (Casey Barton)
Subject: Huh?
Newsgroups: alt.stupidity
When I posted this message, my computer said:
"This program posts new to thousands of machines throughout the entire
civilized world. Your message will cost the net hundereds if not thousands of
dollars to send everywhere. Please be sure you know what you are doing."
I wasn't aware that this was posted anywhere civilized. Do civilized
people have access to this group too? I thought that this was one of the last
true refuges for stupid people. Someplace where we could get away from the
intelligence and common sense of everyday life.
Also, it says the same thing when I post to alt.alien.visitors...and
we *know* there's no one civilized over there...
[viz, first posting in this digest, and one later.... --spaf]
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 29 Nov 91 18:09:10 CST
From: meo@pencom.com (Miles O'Neal)
Subject: long, lost answer
To: spaf (Gene Spafford)
|Can one get hallucinations from out-of-date milk on granola? If
|not, then I actually saw the following on the Damn Riot [Dan Ryan]
|Expressway this morning.
|
|A black man who looked about 40 or so was driving some sort of big
|white Chrysler with headlights and flashers on. He was cutting in
|and out, passing most other cars. And he had a glass of water
|balanced on his head. It fell off when he passed me, and he put
|the empty glass back on his head.
|
|[If this guy subscribes to yucks, let's hear what he was doing.
|If you weren't the guy involved, interesting explanations are
|also welcomed! --spaf]
That'd be me (I was just released, so my mail is sort of backed up,
not unlike an elderly colon without the prunes).
I had drunk a little too much kiwi juice that morning after getting
off work (we had a deadline, and the CIA does NOT like to wait.) I
normally won't bet, but my buddy from New Zealand took advantage of
my state, and bet me my bonus against his I couldn't walk across the
room and back with a glass of kiwi juice on my head. Somehow I
managed.
Double or nothing. He *skipped* across the room and back with the
glass on his head. I retaliated by waltzing the perimeter of the
rrom with the waitress. After a couple of more escalations, we were
betting our annual salary - not real bright.
Anyway, by now the known universe had been reduced to whatever small
bits of the space-time continuum were immediately perceivable around
this stupid glass of kiwi juice. We called it a tie, but then he bet
me his new car I couldn't drive it the length of the Dan Ryan and
back doing at least 10 MPH faster than the traffic average, with the
glass on my head.
By now, I was fried as much from exhaustion as the juice, and I
went for it. He said he'd travel on the floor of the front seat
just to watch. Well, I cranked up that big Chrysler, and off we
roared. The glass wouldn't have fallen off, if I hadn't seen that
Matt Crawford as I passed him. His expression was so funny I got
to snickering, and lost it - all over my lap. Well, Harold (my
NZ friend) had conked there on the floor, so I just stuck the
glass back on my head, and hoped he wouldn't notice when we stopped
that it was empty.
When I went to turn around, a bee flew in the window, and headed
straight for the juice on my pants. I started jumping and
shouting and swatting at it, which woke Harold up, about the time
I ran into the parked police cruiser. Harold was thrown into my
lap. My luck - it was the vice squad. They took one luck, made
their deductions, and hauled us in.
My wife brought some bucks (and wisecracks) and bailed us out.
Chemical analysis bore out my story, so we were free. Except that
Harold's insurance check had bounced, so he did some time for not
having insurance, while I did time for destroying state property.
While in jail, I was of course raped and murdered, and Harold was
found stuffed in a spare tire in the warden's Suburban. All in all,
an experience I hope to NOT repeat.
------------------------------
Date: 30 Nov 91 00:42:06 GMT
From: tmcdonal@ringer.cs.utsa.edu (Tom McDonald)
Subject: Really Tasteless Practical Joke
Newsgroups: alt.tasteless
[The joke is deleted...I liked the signature better. --spaf]
--
667 - The neighbor of the beast.
"A true friend always stabs you in the front" - Oscar Wilde
------------------------------
Date: 2 Dec 91 15:16:22 GMT
From: anachem@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (mark s gilstrap)
Subject: Somthing Heading this way.
Newsgroups: alt.alien.visitors
[Now, I'm not one to make fun of someone else's religious beliefs,
so I won't comment on the content of the following. However, you
should find it interesting in one way or another.
However, I will note that the poster is at Indiana University. --spaf]
In article <422800007@peg> mcollinson@peg.pegasus.oz.au writes:
>
>/* Written 6:49 am Nov 29, 1991 by E59401 in peg:sci.astro */
>/* ---------- "Unknown object ?" ---------- */
>
> Nowadays (27/11/91) on newspaper I've read that an unknown object is
>approaching to the Earth. And it was written that this object was obseved
>by NASA. I just want to know that this news is true or not ?
I've heard Evangelical christians (esp TeeVee variety) refer
to an approaching object more than a few times. I think that
they probably believe it is Christ zooming in from heaven, (and,
if a reality at all, not AntiChrist who will come in wonders
and aerial illusions). Of course this object is not a dark
asteroid, but lightbearing or it wouldn't have "been seen" by
astronomers (if it has been?).
Perhaps its time to repost the fact (and the article which was
the 4th post on this group) that the aerial realm is the place
of activity of the fallen Lucifer (the light bearer) and those
angels who fell with him (demons). Their tools are falsehood
and illusion. The Fathers of the early Christian Church warned
that it was not a good idea to look often or with imaginary
wondering at the heavens, as it is possible to become victim to
the lying wonders of the aerial beings.
UFOs are real phenomena. But they are a phenomena of the
creation of the illusory powers of the father of lies. Before
the space age, UFOs were not spacecraft - this is a product of
the paradigm of our age. The demonic beings (who occupy the
UFOs) are however very similar to the demonic archetypes of the
past. The effects on people are good evidence of the nature of
these beings.
For your own sakes, give up your fantasies and believe that
these manifestations are nothing new, but simply a continuation
of the demonic manifestations which were easily understood by
our forebears who had a simple "unsophisticated" belief in evil.
That these manifestations are increasing in frequency is
a sign of our times and the foolishness of men who reject the
wisdom of the past.
The article "UFOs, a Shattering Assault" is available on
request. See also a very lengthy discussion of the history and
categorization of CEs in "Orthodoxy and the Religion of the
Future".
Based on what I have been able to gather, this object that is
approaching should arrive on about Christmas 1992. The great
"Peace on Earth" accompanying this advent will cause most of you
to worship the being that arrives.
I don't at all recommend drugs!, but I think my experience in
the 60s with hallucinogens gives me a much better understanding
of the reality of illusions, their power, their effects, and the
shaping of new realities for the participant. Illusion is (in a
limited sense) reality. It is the reality of delusion, and we
all suffer its influence over us by the fallen nature of our very
existance. Knowing this, it is easier to make sense of UFOs and
also to not fall victim to the much more seductive illusions to
come.
------------------------------
Date: 25 Nov 91 15:45:55 GMT
From: banta@abingdon.Eng.Sun.COM (242 lbs before cooking)
Subject: Tasteless things seen on T.V. II
Newsgroups: alt.tasteless
[I hate it when people draw cute little maps in their signature files.
This response, however, makes at least one map a little more worthwhile. --spaf]
In article <1991Nov25.055903.16548@kurango.cit.gu.edu.au> lawley@kurango.cit.gu.edu.au (Michael Lawley) writes:
>--
> _--_|\ michael lawley (lawley@cit.gu.edu.au).
>/ *\ The Unicycling Postgrad
>\_.--._/ Griffith University, Computer Science
> v
Run and hide! The vomiting rabbit has returned.
------------------------------
Date: 30 Nov 91 00:30:04 GMT
From: nobody@kodak.com (E. Brown)
Subject: unix PIDs
Newsgroups: rec.humor.funny
Return-Address: ebrown@ssd.kodak.com
I was asking my friend a serious question - I should have thought
a bit more before I asked.
>Neil, Do you know what happens to pids when they get too big.
>I know Process ids always get bigger, but what happens when
>they get bigger than 31 bits? Do they roll over? Do you know?
>Thanks, Eric.
The world stops and everyone dies. 2^31 is 2 billion (give or take a
few). At the rate of one new process per second, 60 per minute, 3600
per hour, 86400 per day, 31536000 per year, 315360000 per decade, it
will take 6.8 decades to reach 2^31. Let me know if you run into a
problem with this, I'll file a bug report. Neil
PS: Oh, you have to include a reproducible program for the bug report,
I guess that makes it tougher :-)
------------------------------
Date: 30 Nov 91 11:30:03 GMT
From: paulo@eik.ii.uib.no
Subject: What are the lawyers doing to the computer industry?
Newsgroups: rec.humor.funny
I found this lurking in the examples/ directory of the Verdix Ada compiler.
-- UNIT: procedure HELLO
-- FILES: hello.a
-- COMPILE: ada hello.a
-- LINK: a.ld hello -o hello
-- PURPOSE: typical first program; use of TEXT_IO package in STANDARD library.
-- DESCRIPTION: prints "Hello, world." message.
-- Usage: hello
-- .......................................................................... --
with TEXT_IO; use TEXT_IO;
procedure hello is
begin
put ("Hello, world.");
new_line;
end hello;
-- .......................................................................... --
--
-- DISTRIBUTION AND COPYRIGHT:
--
-- This software is released to the Public Domain (note:
-- software released to the Public Domain is not subject
-- to copyright protection).
-- Restrictions on use or distribution: NONE
--
-- DISCLAIMER:
--
-- This software and its documentation are provided "AS IS" and
-- without any expressed or implied warranties whatsoever.
-- No warranties as to performance, merchantability, or fitness
-- for a particular purpose exist.
--
-- Because of the diversity of conditions and hardware under
-- which this software may be used, no warranty of fitness for
-- a particular purpose is offered. The user is advised to
-- test the software thoroughly before relying on it. The user
-- must assume the entire risk and liability of using this
-- software.
--
-- In no event shall any person or organization of people be
-- held responsible for any direct, indirect, consequential
-- or inconsequential damages or lost profits.
------------------------------
End of Yucks Digest
------------------------------