From oracle-request Wed Sep 4 08:19:54 1991 Received: by iuvax.cs.indiana.edu Date: Wed, 4 Sep 91 08:19:54 -0500 From: To: oracle-list Subject: Usenet Oracularities #342 Reply-To: oracle-vote X-Face: "9e\S&XFxP?L)~?^jbHC!$jk5#O}v\n#nwz8'd$#(H,+B4n<^{GSCr,![PCrQOV1 nW{vh|Ev<)b!y?'?aysJ)3YJ_/sOl@a'lKaG,uk|Xh3mR+xa]XJ!$vqAjQe?.nst;0/"u?M2K~rC6k~ |)'uWrn%alJW'QwwJJ441kc,m.C!?:EP49(+ X-Planation: X-Face can be viewed with "faces". From the iuvax archive today. === 342 ================================================================== Title: Usenet Oracularities #342 Compiled-By: Steve Kinzler Date: Wed, 4 Sep 91 08:19:54 -0500 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. Let us know what you like! Send your ratings of these Oracularities on a scale of 1 = "not funny" to 5 = "very funny" with the volume number to oracle-vote on iuvax, eg: 342 2 1 3 4 3 5 3 3 4 1 337 14 votes 12614 52232 52610 32630 15233 35510 13532 18320 48110 25223 337 2.7 mean 3.4 2.6 2.2 2.6 3.1 2.3 3.1 2.4 1.9 2.9 --- 342-01 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Christopher Pettus The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > What are the top ten opinions about me? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } 1. You have committed many major blunders, but you are still capable of } emitting strong bursts of electromagnetic radiation from your nose. } } 2. You have a light fruity taste, excellent with burned toast and } anchovies. } } 3. You are as dramatic as an eel in heat. } } 4. It is not advisable to attempt to pass you on the road when you are } driving your red Mercedes Doom Car and swilling black vodka. } } 5. You are not as smelly as a dead fish that has been lying in the sun } for a week. } } 6. One should not engage in sexual intercourse with you without having } drunken several cases of black vodka. } } 7. Your girlfriend is a boy, but you haven't noticed yet. } } 8. If you were any shorter, you'd be a potato pancake. } } 9. We don't like your taste in X-rated videos. } } 10. Still, as far as incompetant overbearing tin-plated munchkins go, } you're not bad. --- 342-02 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Christopher Pettus The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > o great oracle, o wise oracle, o oracle whose discount tickets > to disneyworld are bigger than everyone else's, o oracle whose > tanks are larger than those in china, o oracle whose socks are > less smelly than your average college jock, o oracle who keeps > the lights on in the fridge even after the door is shut, > > what is the square root of a cheese sandwich, and does it wear > lingerie? and if it does, who was it's mother? and did it ever > read beowulf in 12th grade english? and did it finish high school? > and does it eat chocolate? and how many miles does it get to the > gallon? and is it a monochrome monitor? and has it ever had a dog > named sebastian? and if it did, where is it now? > > seeking enlightenment And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } A cheese bin. } Yes. } Its mother was Donald Duck. } No, but it read A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM in the original Urdu. } It never finished high school, but once it blew up a Montgomery Wards } store. } It expels chocolate from its ears on occasion. } 151 miles per gallon (of chocolate milk) } It is a bisexual dominator. } It never had a dog at all, but the dog's name *was* Sebastian. --- 342-03 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Christopher Pettus The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Oh thrilling and ruby Oracle, I humble myself in the face of your > pint-size mushroom woman. > > Elvis just sent me email. Said he read my postings on > sci.graphics.messianic, soc.startrek.mandarin, > soc.national.permissiveness, and sci.smalltalk.windsurfing, and that he > had decided that I was the Great Chihuahua of Tennassee and I should > take up his (Elvis') guitar and sing his songs forevermore. > > Now, I really don't like Elvis' music. Do I really have to do it? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Great Chihuahua (pronounced properly as CHEE-who-a-who-a), give me } a break! When the Great Chihuahua was alive, I used to speak with him } daily. Elvis, once again, is misinformed. You don't smell anything } like the Great Chihuahua (something you should be infinitely thankfull } for). What Elvis really called you was the great Achoo-a-choo-a. He } meant for you to quit sneezing on his oversized belly. } As for Elvis' songs, nobody ever really liked them anyway. } } As a special bonus since you were one of the first 100 callers, I } will let you in on a little secret. Elvis and Ronald McDonald are } really the same person. --- 342-04 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: John.McCartney@ebay.sun.com ( The Lion of Symmetry ) The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > So I have this guy, he's a professor in data-analysis, and more than a > few theories to his credit, and he's kind of an asshole, as he is not > supposed to be a sympathetic character; but when the people at SETI > approach him with transmissions they have recieved, he will translate > them and subject humankind to no end of trouble. Thus an agency from > the future has sent back a small box to occupy him, to keep his > attention away from the SETI transmissions. The box is sent back five > million years, to be thrust up in continental strata where it will be > found by the military. > It is labelled Important Data, and there is no one more suited to > figure out the nature of the data than he. They shut him into a base > with enough personel to get the data from the cube and try to translate > it. After many years, though, they have no luck, until a sudden > inspiration on the professor's part leads him to the successful > translation of the data. This only leads him to a small smug message > telling him that the function of the cube was to keep him occupied > until just before his death, when it would be too late for him to > figure out what it was they are preventing him from doing. The sudden > inspiration should be the same one that allowed him to translate the > SETI transmissions in the other, now vanished, timeline. > > Any suggestions? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } This professor is indeed in quite a pickle, isn't he! If memory serves } me right, the SETI transmit uses the same frequency as the Kbtaltishnz } Free Radio over in the 7th dimension. A buddy of mine runs the Top 40 } Countdown there each mellinium (measured in nanoglyphs) so there is } probably a way for you get on their emailing list. } } Send a note to max_headroom@network23.7thdimen.org with thw word 'help' } in the Subject: line, and the words "Grovel grovel Coke(tm) Addict" as } the body of the message. } } The only thing that YOU can do in the meantime is to shave your head, } pierce every square inch of your body with pop rivets, consume five (5) } gallons of glow-in-the-dark paint, lay on a tanning bed for fifteen } hours and run thru the campus at sundown, yelling "SOMEBODY'S GOTTA DO } SOMETHING!!!" repeatedly until caught. } } You owe the Oracle a VHS copy of you in action. --- 342-05 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: mzintl@plasma.ps.uci.edu (Michael Zintl) The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > O Wise and Godawful Oracle, Thou who wrote the source code for > TELNET, Thou who hast hacked DARPANet and Century House, I beseech Thee, > I have been womanless for seven months. I can now smell estrogen > at fifty yards, against the wind. I am seized by urges that it takes > all my strength to fight down--I want desperately to remove my clothes > and run around on all fours, barking at the moon and foaming at the > mouth. > If this situation does not change very, very soon, the top of my > head is going to come off, everyone around me will hear a faint "boing" > as something snaps inside my head, and I'm going to go on a twelve-state > psychotic mass murder spree. Not necessarily in that order. Help! > What can I do? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Godawful? You must have me confused with Jimmy Swaggart. } } Your condition is a common one, undoubted brought on by the perfume } "Rabid" which you smelled in a mall you recently visited. This scent is } made from the roots of the wolfbane plant and is outlawed in all } sensible countries. } } There is a temporary cure, but it has been outlawed in public and } declared a venial sin by the Pope. It involves reading material such } as the magazine of top floor apartments or movies without plots (and I } am not talking about David Lynch here). } } The permanent cure is not simple. It involves many steps and several } large applications of hard earned currency. I would explain it to you } except that I see that you will not need it. You will be found by two } women next week in the woods while running about naked on all fours } howling at the moon. They will ask if you are game and you will answer } in the affirmative before realizing that they are hunters. They will } shoot you and _then_ mount you. } } You owe the Oracle another old joke. --- 342-06 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: well!well!ewhac@apple.com (Leo 'Bols Ewhac' Schwab) The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Oh Oracle cat dict.txt | grep "Great Words" >/dev/oracle > > Where is the "Bit Bucket"? Where do thoes poor bits sent to /dev/null > go? > > Go they go to Bit Heaven? Or do they just Blink out? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } --- 342-07 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Klone (aka Daniel Klein) The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Who makes it doesn't need it. > Who buys it doesn't want it. > Who uses it doesn't notice it. > What is it? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Hmmm. Thou art posing a riddle to the Oracle? Should be an easy one } considering my omniscience. I'll just consult my Oracle's Book of All } Known Conundrums and Curly Questions. } .... } Ahhh.... here it is: } Politicians. Nobody needs them, so whoever made them did so only out } of malice and general dislike of the human race in general. } Ohh, sorry! There's more. Well, the second bit sort of rules out } politicians, doesn't it? I'd certainly want a politician if I paid } good money for one. } } Oh, I think I'll need the second volume. Wait a sec, I'll drive in the } other semi-trailer. } } Here it is: } } Vax VMS. } } You owe the Oracle 40 gallons of diesel fuel and a decent operating } system. --- 342-08 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: arf@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (The Nefarious Scotto) The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Oh great and wise Oracle, whose knowledge of events past and future > got him awesome grades in school, tell me if gravity will ever be > understood and controlled by mere mortals. And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Silly human, the Oracle was begotten and not made! I did not need to } be taught to foresee, since I even foresaw learning in the first place. } Since you did not realize this, your question begins to make sense. } Actually, mere mortals have understood and controlled gravity for } years, but they have suffered for this power. } } The exemplar of the gravity researchers of the 1940s and 1950s was a } certain W. E. Coyote, of Los Angeles, California. The legendary } scientist accidentally discovered the following law in early 1947: } } Anvillary Corollary to Newtonian Physics: } o anvils accelerate either faster or slower than other falling } bodies. } } By early 1952, after countless trials with his assistant, R. Runner, } Coyote discovered: } } Second Anvillary Corollary: } o the acceleration of anvils depends solely on how much pain they } can cause: if by accelerating slower than other bodies, they can } land on top of that body after it reaches a surface, then they } will do so. } } By late 1952, Coyote, using himself as a subject, discovered the } principle that almost won him a Nobel Prize: } } Coyote's Law of Falling Bodies: } o bodies falling from a great height will do two things: } o they will have precisely 2.5 seconds to run in place, without } falling, to the nearest protrusion; and } o if no protrusion exists, their heads will initially fall } slower than the rest of themselves. } } By 1954, however, Coyote was a physical and emotional wreck. Feeling } that he was on the verge of a breakthrough in physics, he filmed many } of his experiments in which he tried to master gravity. Unfortunately, } Coyote's fertile imagination got the best of him. He became convinced } that Runner was not only trying to drive him crazy, but also that } Runner, with the help of Warner Brothers, was actually changing the } laws of gravity from minute to minute. Coyote was eventually } institutionalized and became the model for Saleiri in the musical } "Amadeus." } } In sum, gravity is just too heavy a subject for mortals to bear. } } You owe the Oracle a plate of free birdseed. --- 342-09 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: John.McCartney@ebay.sun.com ( The Lion of Symmetry ) The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Oh most mighty Oracle, you who graces the very fabric of reality, you > who most lovingly has snugglebunnies with Lisa, please enlighten this > weary slave of academia: > > What are the ten best ways to correct the attitudes of an entire lab of > arrogant, pubescent, idiot froshling biology majors in such a way that > I don't get fired as their lab teaching assistant?? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Practical jokes are always a hit with arrogant froshlings. The big } trick is not getting fired, so you have to make it appear as if someone } else played the trick on you and your class. Biology lends itself to } really twisted jokes, so it sounds like you are in for some fun. In an } ancient and fairly well forgotten tradition, I will ask you a riddle } and let you figure out if it means anything. } } What common dissectables could leap forth from other common } dissectables? } } or for the mentally disabled, since the Oracle is an equal opportunity } soothsayer, } } How far would a frog leap if it had been sewn into the chest cavity of } a dead cat overnight? } } No one ever said fortunetelling was pleasant. So it is with Biology } too. } } You owe the Oracle a video tape of the above proceedings. Mail it to } America's Funniest Cruel and Sick Jokes. --- 342-10 --------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Klone (aka Daniel Klein) The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > mzngly stt rcl, whs kys m nt ft t prss, whr hv my vwls gn? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Yoouur vooweels aaree . . . Heey! Cuut thaat oouut! Yoouu } shaall paay deeaarly foor thiis! } } Yoouu oowee thee Ooraaclee aa neew keeybooaard.