From kinzler@cs.indiana.edu Mon Dec 18 19:34:29 1989
Path: iuvax!kinzler
From: Stephen Kinzler <kinzler@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu>
Newsgroups: rec.humor
Subject: Usenet Oracularities #84
Message-ID: <31806@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu>
Date: 19 Dec 89 00:34:29 GMT
Sender: kinzler@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu

=== 84 ===================================================================
Title: Usenet Oracularities #84
Compiled-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>
Date: 19 Dec 89 00:34:29 GMT

To find out how to participate in the Usenet Oracle, send mail to:
    oracle@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu    or    {ames,rutgers}!iuvax!oracle
with the word "help" in the subject line.  To receive these postings via
mail, send mail to oracle-request on the same machine.  Back postings
are available via anonymous ftp on iuvax.cs.indiana.edu (129.79.254.192)
in the directory pub/oracle.
Disclaimer:  You think *I* write all these?  Hah!

--- 84-01 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> Do you go to R.I.T.?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} Do I go to the Rochester Institute of Technology?
} It's time for a quick God consultation...
} Me: "Oh God in Heaven above, from whom my powers come, hallowed be thy
} name..."
} God: "Yes, yes. What is it?"
} Me: "Some netwit asked me if I go to RIT."
} God: "Well, you don't."
} Me: "Yes, I noticed."
} God: "Of course you did.  You're the Oracle.  You know the answer to
} any question as soon as it is asked.  The only difference between you
} and me is someone has to ask YOU the question first.  Plus I'm
} omnipotent, too."
} Me: "Well, also, I try to keep track of which academic institution I'm
} currently attending."
} God: "That too."
} Me: "But anyway, the point is..."
} God: "Yes?"
} Me: "Why do I get all these dumb questions?"
} God: "`Ours not to question why; ours but to do or die.'"
} Me: "What is that from?"
} God: "What is that from?"
} Me: "Rudyard Kipling."
} God: "If you knew, why did you ask me?"
} Me: "Ha ha.  Very funny.  I know you're a humorist, God, but I really
} could use a small break.  Especially after making me be forty-five
} minutes late to my final Thursday morning."
} God: "I guess I can cut down on the dumb question load."
} Me: "Thank God!"
} God: "You're welcome."
} Me: "See you later, ma'am."
}
} NO.
}
} YOU OWE THE ORACLE: An official Virginia Tech sweatshirt.

--- 84-02 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

>         O Oracle,
>
>         Why are the grid-bugs still in the network?  Did the
> Net.exterminators miss them, or does the software need to be rewritten
> again?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} Actually, If you must know, the grid bugs are pawns in the higher shceme
} of life.  They are a necessary part of computing life.  You see, in real
} life, there is good, and there is evil.  There is Yin and there is Yang.
} There is Yogi and there is the Park Ranger.  And in this very sterile
} world of the computer community, there is an awful lot of good,
} productivity going on, so if this was allowed to run rampant, we would
} all loose our appreciation of just how benificial and incredibly fun
} computing is!  So, to keep things in perspective, I present to you
} Grid-bugs.
}
} Good/Bad Day....
}
}                   The Oracle.

--- 84-03 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> Once I had a wonderful teddy bear, named Pierre, and about four years
> ago he left me to make his way in the world.  He never writes.  Could
> you find out what he is up to?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} Pierre, unknown to most people, briefly became the president of IBM.
} Unfortunately, when the time came for the first executive meeting, he
} was embarrassed to be seen, so he quit the job, and went to look for
} other forms of work.  Eventually, because he never found a job and was
} greatly in debt, he sold himself into slavery, and was packaged by Gund,
} and put on the shelves of a Child World store...  He was then bought by
} some parents to give to their daughter, Cathy, and she named him
} Avercromby.  She takes good care of him, and hates it when people push
} his nose in.

--- 84-04 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> O, Oracle, most flatulent tell me:
>
> Why is there air?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} There is air because, if there weren't, the clouds would all fall to the
} ground with horrible thuds.

--- 84-05 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> How many strings does my guitar have?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} One is the number of my true love's head,
} Twain are the people that lie upon her bed,
} Three are the strings on my querent's flawed guitar
} Four in number are the strings a-drinking at the bar.
} Five are the elements of which the world is made,
} Six are the elephants at rest under the shade.
} Seven are the dollars that my roast of mutton cost
} Eight are the valuable credit cards I've lost.
} Nine are the pickles that adorn my garlic bread
} Ten are the curses all upon my mad cook's head.
} Eleven are the colds I have that make me sneeze and sniffle,
} Twelve's the number of the line at which I'll stop this drivel.
}
} You owe the Oracle a poracle

--- 84-06 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> Why do i keep eating sushi and singing about wakizashis?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

}  Oddly enough, one tends to effect the other, but both are a symptom of
} a much wider problem, that of trendyism.  Trendyism pops up in every
} decade and is best discovered by some common thread that effects its
} victims.
}
}  For instance, in the fifties, people played with hoola hoops a lot and
} used the word "swell", in the sixties people took lots of hallucinogenic
} drugs and called everyone "man".  Sadly, in the seventies, a lot of
} people experimented with pop religions, (est, I'm okay, you're slime)
} and kept asking "What's the Bottom line?".
}
}  So the eighties is no different, people eat foods such as sushi and
} sing songs about wakizashis.  These same people name their children
} "Gavin" or "Zenith" and spend a lot of time using crystal therapy to
} improve their health.  You my son/daughter are a unique person.  Why,
} because you have questioned your behavior.  It is time to begin your
} rights of passage as a neophyte into the greater wisdom, known in the
} secrete places of the most high Pantheon as the Two Roads.
}
}  You must decide which road you wish to journey on.  One road is known
} as the Zappa Trail.  Here you will realize that basically, everyone is
} either a chump or a jerk, that "Broken Hearts are for Assholes" and to
} "Shutup and play yer guitar".  This is the humble road.  A still voice
} crying in the forrest saying "Ram it up yer poop shoot".  You will not
} be like the others but you will be a light of wisdom.  You will also not
} go to many parties and you can forget about getting laid, unfortunately.
} This is the price of enlightenment.
}
}  The second road is all too easily traveled.  This road is known as the
} Ivan Boesky Quick Buck Highway to Heck.  Here you do not look inward to
} find the answer.  You analyse market reports and graphs of societal
} trends to find out what the majority in the 1990's will be fixated upon.
} If you get the info quick enough, you invest, invest, invest.  If you
} are correct you make a killing and spend the rest of your life on cable
} TV hawking your very own get rich quick scheme.  But beware, the ghost
} of the boob who is still sitting on a warehouse of Cabbage Patch Dolls
} calls out to you saying "Don't Fuck It Up".  Make sure you are right,
} don't get caught with your Bell Bottoms down.
}
}  Well, there it is my son/daughter, true enlightenment.  Which is it
} going to be?  True wisdom or cool cozy gaudiness.  I see.  Well, I wish
} I could say I'm suprised.  Pick up your Real Estate Investment Packet
} and some VO-5 for your hair and I'll see you Sunday Night on the USA
} network, sell, sell, sell.
}
} You owe the Oracle a BMW and a blank check ......

--- 84-07 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> What should I ask?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} You should ask questions about:
}   1. sex
}   2. Lisa
}   3. anyone else you happen to know
}   4. directions on how to get from somewhere to somewher eelse
}   5. Other things as you see fit..
}
} You should *not* ask
}   - about the meaning of life
}   - about woodchucks

--- 84-08 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> if u cn reed ths, wot du i winn?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} You dirty, insolent rat!
} Is it really so hard for you to get the idea into that pathetic excuse
} for a brain of yours, that the Oracle really is *omniscient*???  That I
} really know *everything*?  That I can read *any* message, however much
} intellectual contortions you go through to make it unreadable?  That the
} fact that *I* can read your stupid message is not any ground for *you*
} to be rewarded in *any* way, except, possibly, with a sound thrashing?
}
} Obviously not.  In fact, the Oracle receives about 500 questions of your
} kind each day, "questions" just designed to check if the Usenet Oracle
} isn't really the Usenet Idiot (which I would have to be, not to be able
} to break your feeble attempts at obfuscation).
}
} Even though your tiny brain is surrounded by four inches of solid bone,
} one would think by now the message should have penetrated it:  I haven't
} got the time to answer this kind of pseudo-questions!  People are
} actually sending Me lots of Vital Questions of Life, the Universe and
} Everything (such as:  "What's Lisa's bra size?", "Who created the hole
} in donuts?" and "How can I have sex with the girl who's playing Xconq on
} the terminal next to mine?").  And you have the *stomach* to send me
} idiotic questions as some Oracular intelligence test!  Know, mortal
} worm, that My intelligence transcends yours like yours transcends Dan
} Quayle's.
}
} Let it be known that the next time anyone asks a question like this, he
} (women are much too sensible to ask such questions) will be put in a
} special corner of the net.hell, which I have ordered my daemons to
} prepare for him, and where he will be tormented by constantly bouncing
} mail, erratic file servers and constant flaming from all of Usenet at
} once.
}
}
} You owe the Oracle $453,689.14 (for all the computer time used in
} answering questions similar to yours).

--- 84-09 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> Why do people not give me answers as good as I give them when I'm the
> Oracle?  And why does everyone think I go to Virginia Tech when I don't?
> And WHY did some guy think I was AMY?!?!?!

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} Amy,
}
} You people at Georgia Tech sure have a different sense of humor from the
} the rest of us out here.  No matter how hard you try to throw us off, we
} know WHO you are.  All those questions were rhetorical, and we know it.
}
} If you continue to breach the rules of anonymity on the oracle we'll
} consider having you ousted from V-Tech and send to a real school.
}
} You owe the oracle a good answer.  <grin>

--- 84-10 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>

The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> h mght rcl, wh knws vrthng:
> Wh dn't gt n vwls whn tp? s m kbrd brkn?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} No, your kyoard i not ron.  Th vol ar thr, ut you ar not al to typ th.
} You ar uffrin fro th o-alld "vol-phoia", hih an you ar afraid of touhin
} th vol.
}
} Thi i an xapl of "pri-phoia".  In thi a, you annot typ lttr ho nur in th
} alphat ar pri nur.