More Jokes

Since I am a nerd, I find these too funny.

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#1: PETS endorse Microsoft


NEW YORK - People for Ethical Treatment of Software (PETS) announced today that more software companies have been added to the group's "watch list" of companies that regularly practice software testing.

"There is no need for software to be mistreated in this way so that companies like these can market new products," said Ken Grandola, a spokesman for PETS. "Alternative methods of testing these products are available."

According to PETS, these companies force software to undergo lengthy and arduous tests - often without rest - for hours or days at a time. Employees are assigned to "break" the software by any means necessary, and inside sources report that they often joke about "torturing" the software.

"It's no joke," Grandola said. "innocent programs from the day they are compiled, are cooped up in tiny rooms and 'crashed' for hours on end. They spend their whole lives on dirty, ill-maintained computers, and they are unceremoniously deleted when they're not needed anymore." Grandola said the software is kept in unsanitary conditions and is infested with bugs.

"We know that alternatives to this horror exist," he said, citing industry giant Microsoft Corp., as a company that has become successful without resorting to software testing.

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#2: Creators Admit Unix and C Language Hoax

In an announcement that stunned the computer industry, Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie and Brian Kernighan admitted the Unix operating system and C programming language created by them is an elaborate prank, kept alive over 20 years.

Speaking at the recent UnixWorld Software Development Forum, Thompson revealed the following: "In 1969, AT&T had just terminated their work with the GE/Honeywell/AT&T Multics project. Brian and I had started work with an early release of Pascal from Professor Niklaus Wirth's ETH labs in Switzerland and we were impressed with its elegant simplicity and power. Dennis had just finished reading 'Bored of the Rings', a National Lampoon parody of the Tolkien's 'Lord of the Rings' trilogy.

As a lark, we decided to do parodies of the Multics environment and Pascal. Dennis and I were responsible for the operating environment. We looked at Multics and designed the new OS to be as complex and cryptic as possible to maximize casual users' frustration levels, calling it Unix as a parody of Multics, as well as other more risque allusions. We sold the terse command language to novitiates by telling them that it saved them typing."

Then Dennis and Brian worked on a warped version of Pascal, called 'A'. 'A' looked a lot like Pascal, but elevated the notion of the direct memory address (which Wirth had banished) to the central concept of the language. This was Dennis's contribution, and he in fact coined the term "pointer" as an innocuous sounding name for a truly malevolent construct. Brian must be credited with the idea of having absolutely no standard I/O specification: this ensured that at least 50% of the typical commercial program would have to be recoded when changing hardware platforms. Brian was also responsible for pitching this lack of I/O as a feature: it allowed us to describe the language as "truly portable".

When we found others were actually creating real programs with A, we removed compulsory type-checking on function arguments. Later, we added a notion we called "casting": this allowed the programmer to treat an integer as though it were a 50k user-defined structure. When we found that some programmers were simply not using pointers, we eliminated the ability to pass structures to functions, enforcing their use in even the Simplest applications.

We sold this, and many other features, as enhancements to the efficiency of the language. In this way, our prank evolved into B, BCPL, and finally C.

We stopped when we got a clean compile on the following syntax:
for (;P("\n"),R-;P(""))
for(e=3DC;e-;P("_"+(*u++/8)%2))P(""+(*u/4)%2);

At one time, we joked about selling this to the Soviets to set their computer science progress back 20 or more years. Unfortunately, AT&T and other US corporations actually began using Unix and C. We decided we'd better keep mum, assuming it was just a passing phase.

In fact, it's taken US companies over 20 years to develop enough expertise to generate useful applications using this 1960's technological parody. We are impressed with the tenacity of the general Unix and C programmer. In fact, Brian, Dennis and I have never ourselves attempted to write a commercial application in this environment. We feel really guilty about the chaos, confusion and truly awesome programming projects that have resulted from our silly prank so long ago."

Dennis Ritchie said: "What really tore it (just when AIDA was catching on), was that Bjarne Stroustrup caught onto our joke. He extended it to further parody, Smalltalk. Like us, he was caught by surprise when nobody laughed. So he added multiple inheritance, virtual base classes, and later ... templates. All to no avail.

So we now have compilers that can compile 100,000 lines per second, but need to process header files for 25 minutes before they get to the meat of "Hello, World".

Major Unix and C vendors and customers, including AT&T, Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, GTE, NCR, and DEC have refused to comment on the announcement. Officials of Borland International, a leading vendor of object-oriented tools, including Turbo Pascal and Borland C++, stated they suspected this for a couple of years. In fact, the notoriously late Quattro Pro for Windows was originally written in C++. Borland CEO Del Yocam said: "I'm told that, after two and a half years of programming, and massive programmer burn-out, we recoded the whole thing in Turbo Pascal in three months. It's fair to say that Turbo Pascal saved our bacon back then". Another Borland spokesman said that they would continue to enhance their Pascal products, and halt further efforts to develop C/C++.

Professor Wirth of the ETH institute and father of the Pascal, Modula 2 and Oberon structured languages, cryptically said "P.T. Barnum was right."

He had no further comments.

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#3: Software developers vs Drug Dealers

Drug dealers: Refer to their clients as "users".
Software developers: Refer to their clients as "users".

Drug dealers: "The first one's free!"
Software developers: "Download a free trial version..."

Drug dealers: Strange jargon: "Stick", "Rock", "Dime bag", "E".
Software developers: Strange jargon: "SCSI, "RTFM", "Java", "ISDN".

Drug dealers: Realize that there's tons of cash in the 14- to 25-year-old market.
Software developers: Realize that there's tons of cash in the 14- to 25-year-old market.

Drug dealers: Have important South-East Asian connections (to help move the stuff).
Software developers: Have important South-East Asian connections (to help debug the code).

Drug dealers: Job is assisted by the industry's producing newer, more potent mixes.
Software developers: Job is assisted by the industry's producing newer, faster machines.

Drug dealers: Often seen in the company of pimps and hustlers.
Software developers: Often seen in the company of marketing people and venture capitalists.

Drug dealers: Their product causes unhealthy addictions.
Software developers: DOOM. Quake. SimCity. Duke Nukem 3D. 'Nuff said.

Drug dealers: Do your job well, and you can sleep with sexy movie stars who depend on you.
Software developers: Damn! Damn! DAMN!!!

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If you think these were boring - then you DO have a life. I don´t. So I laugh. At these too.

Jokes

To break this gloomy trend I present you some jokes that I find funny.

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#1: Hotel soap

Below is some correspondence which actually occurred between a London hotel's staff and one of its guests. The London hotel involved submitted this to the Sunday Times. No name was mentioned.
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Dear Maid,

Please do not leave any more of those little bars of soap in my bathroom since I have brought my own bath-sized Dial. Please remove the six unopened little bars from the shelf under the medicine chest and another three in the shower soap dish. They are in my way.

Thank you,
S. Berman
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Dear Room 635,

I am not your regular maid. She will be back tomorrow, Thursday, from her day off. I took the 3 hotel soaps out of the shower soap dish as you requested. The 6 bars on your shelf I took out of your way and put on top of your Kleenex dispenser in case you should change your mind. This leaves only the 3 bars I left today which my instructions from the management is to leave 3 soaps daily. I hope this is satisfactory.

Kathy,
Relief Maid
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Dear Maid

I hope you are my regular maid. Apparently Kathy did not tell you about my note to her concerning the little bars of soap. When I got back to my room this evening I found you had added 3 little Camays to the shelf under my medicine cabinet.

I am going to be here in the hotel for two weeks and have brought my own bath-size Dial so I won't need those 6 little Camays which are on the shelf.

They are in my way when shaving, brushing teeth, etc. Please remove them.

S. Berman
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Dear Mr. Berman,

My day off was last Wed. so the relief maid left 3 hotel soaps which we are instructed by the management. I took the 6 soaps which were in your way on the shelf and put them in the soap dish where your Dial was.
I put the Dial in the medicine cabinet for your convenience.
I didn't remove the 3 complimentary soaps which are always placed inside the medicine cabinet for all new check-ins and which you did not object to when you checked in last Monday.

Please let me know if I can of further assistance.

Your regular maid,
Dotty
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Dear Mr. Berman,

The assistant manager, Mr. Kensedder, informed me this A.M. that you called him last evening and said you were unhappy with your maid service. I have assigned a new girl to your room. I hope you will accept my apologies for any past inconvenience. If you have any future complaints please contact me so I can give it my personal attention.

Call extension 1108 between 8AM and 5PM.

Thank you.

Elaine Carmen
Housekeeper
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Dear Miss Carmen,

It is impossible to contact you by phone since I leave the hotel for business at 745 AM and don't get back before 530 or 6PM. That's the reason I called Mr. Kensedder last night. You were already off duty.

I only asked Mr. Kensedder if he could do anything about those little bars of soap. The new maid you assigned me must have thought I was a new check-in today, since she left another 3 bars of hotel soap in my medicine cabinet along with her regular delivery of 3 bars on the bath-room shelf.

In just 5 days here I have accumulated 24 little bars of soap.

Why are you doing this to me?

S. Berman
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Dear Mr. Berman,

Your maid, Kathy, has been instructed to stop delivering soap to your room and remove the extra soaps.

If I can be of further assistance, please call extension 1108 between 8AM and 5PM.

Thank you,

Elaine Carmen,
Housekeeper
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Dear Mr. Kensedder,

My bath-size Dial is missing. Every bar of soap was taken from my room including my own bath-size Dial.

I came in late last night and had to call the bellhop to bring me 4 little Cashmere Bouquets.

S. Berman
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Dear Mr. Berman,

I have informed our housekeeper, Elaine Carmen, of your soap problem. I cannot understand why there was no soap in your room since our maids are instructed to leave 3 bars of soap each time they service a room.
The situation will be rectified immediately.

Please accept my apologies for the inconvenience.

Martin L. Kensedder
Assistant Manager
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Dear Mrs. Carmen,

Who the hell left 54 little bars of Camay in my room? I came in last night and found 54 little bars of soap. I don't want 54 little bars of Camay.

I want my one damn bar of bath-size Dial.

Do you realize I have 54 bars of soap in here. All I want is my bath size Dial.
Please give me back my bath-size Dial.

S. Berman
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Dear Mr. Berman,

You complained of too much soap in your room so I had them removed.
Then you complained to Mr. Kensedder that all your soap was missing so I personally returned them.
The 24 Camays which had been taken and the 3 Camays you are supposed to receive daily (sic).
I don't know anything about the 4 Cashmere Bouquets.

Obviously your maid, Kathy, did not know I had returned your soaps so she also brought 24 Camays plus the 3 daily Camays.

I don't know where you got the idea this hotel issues bath-size Dial. I was able to locate some bath-size Ivory which I left in your room.

Elaine Carmen
Housekeeper
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Dear Mrs. Carmen,

Just a short note to bring you up-to-date on my latest soap inventory.

As of today I possess:

* On shelf under medicine cabinet - 18 Camay in 4 stacks of 4 and 1 stack of 2.
* On Kleenex dispenser - 11 Camay in 2 stacks of 4 and 1 stack of 3.
* On bedroom dresser - 1 stack of 3 Cashmere Bouquet, 1stack of 4 hotel-size Ivory, and 8 Camay in 2 stacks of 4.
* Inside medicine cabinet - 14 Camay in 3 stacks of 4 and 1 stack of 2.
* In shower soap dish - 6 Camay, very moist.
* On northeast corner of tub - 1 Cashmere Bouquet, slightly used.
* On northwest corner of tub - 6 Camays in 2 stacks of 3.

Please ask Kathy when she services my room to make sure the stacks are neatly piled and dusted. Also, please advise her that stacks of more than 4 have a tendency to tip.

May I suggest that my bedroom window sill is not in use and will make an excellent spot for future soap deliveries.

One more item, I have purchased another bar of bath-sized Dial which I am keeping in the hotel vault in order to avoid further misunderstandings.

S. Berman
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#2: Eating bald eagle

A forest ranger is making rounds in a remote part of the wooded reserve when he comes across an unkempt man, sitting at a make-shift campfire, and, to the ranger's horror, eating a fish and a bald eagle.

The man is quickly put in jail for the crime.

When he was soon brought to trial, the Judge asked the man: "Do you know that eating a bald eagle is a federal offense?"

"Yes I do." replied the man, "but if you let me argue my case, I'll explain what happened.

"You may proceed," said the judge.

"I got lost in the woods, and hadn't had anything real to eat for two weeks," the man explained. "I was so hungry, I was eating plants to stay alive. Next thing I see is a Bald Eagle swooping down at the lake grabbing some fish. I thought that if I startled the Eagle I could maybe steal the fish.

Low and behold, the eagle lighted upon a nearby tree stump to eat the fish. I threw a stone toward the eagle hoping he would drop the fish and fly away. Unfortunately, in my weakened condition, my aim was off, and the rock hit the eagle squarely on his poor little head, and killed it.

I thought long and hard about what had happened, but figured that since I killed it I might as well eat it since it would be more disgraceful to let it rot on the ground."

The judge says he will take a recess to analyze the defendant's testimony. 15 minutes goes by and the judge returns: "Due to the extreme circumstance you were under and because you didn't intend to kill the eagle, the court will dismiss the charges."

The Judge then leans over the bench and whispers: "If you don't mind my asking, what does a bald eagle taste like?"

"Well your honor, it is hard to explain. The best I can describe it's a bit more tender than a California Condor but lacks the tang of a Spotted Owl."

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#3: Crazy freeway driver

Ralph, a Leisure Village senior citizen was driving down the San Diego freeway, on his way home, when his car phone rang.

Answering, he heard his wife's voice urgently warning him, "Ralph, I just heard on the Channel 2 news that there's some crazy man in a car going the wrong way on 5 freeway. Please be careful!"
"Hell! It's not just one car going the wrong way," exclaimed Ralph.

"It's hundreds of them!"

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#4: He knows you

A State Trooper pulls an elderly couple over for speeding.
The trooper asks the driver for his license.

The man's wife, who is hard-of-hearing yells, "WHAT DID HE SAY?"
The man yells to his wife, "HE WANTS MY LICENSE!"
She says, "OH!"

The trooper looks at the license and says, "Well, you're from New York City. I visited there once."
The wife says, "WHAT DID HE SAY?"
The husband yells, "THE TROOPER SAYS HE HAS BEEN TO NEW YORK CITY!"
The wife says, "OH!"

The trooper then leans into the car and tells the guy, "Yeah, I had the worst sex of my entire life in New York City."
The wife says, "WHAT DID HE SAY?"
The husband yells back, "HE SAID HE KNOWS YOU!"

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#5: Computerized diagnoses

A man complained to his friends: "My elbow really hurts. I guess I should see a doctor."
His friend offered, "Don't do that. There is a computer at the drug store that can diagnose anything quicker and cheaper than a doctor. Simply put in a sample of your urine and the computer will diagnose your problem and tell you what you can do about it. It only costs $10.00."

The man figured he had nothing to lose and so he filled a jar up with a urine sample and went to the drug store. Finding the computer, he poured in the sample and deposited his $10. The computer started making noises and the various lights started flashing.
After a brief pause, out popped a small slip of paper on which was printed:

ANALYSIS:
You have tennis elbow
Soak your arm in warm water
Avoid heavy labor
It will be better in two weeks.

Later that evening while thinking how amazing this new technology was, and how it would change science forever, he began to wonder if the machine could be fooled. He decided to give it a try.

He mixed together some tap water, a stool sample from his dog, urine samples from his daughter and wife, and to top it off, he masturbated into the concoction. He went back to the drug store, located the machine, poured in the sample, and deposited $10.

The machine again made the usual noises and printed the following:

ANALYSIS:
Your tap water is too hard - get a water softener
Your dog has worms - give him vitamins
Your daughter is on drugs - put her in rehab
Your wife is pregnant - it ain't yours - get a lawyer
And if you don't stop jerking off, your tennis elbow will never get better.

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Well, I never said that YOU would think they were funny, did I? But I laugh. Still.

How to find the Right One

People are constantly searching for Mr or Mrs Right.

The True Love.

The Only One.

Someone that will change their life for ever. And that they will live happily ever after with.

And they never succed. Almost never.

And yet, if you think about it - surely there are uglier, poorer and more disgusting people than yourself having happy relationships?

This is how I think it is:

First, people are constantly putting themselves down.

You see flaws and imperfections in yourselves, that others never see - or maybe even thinks of as advantages.

That can be anything from physcial attributes like height, weight, sizes of breasts or sexual organs, shape of nose, lips, eyes, color of hair and to inner attributes, way of talking or laughing, humour, behaviour ... well, you probably can expand the list.

Of course - nobody is perfect.

Those flaws that one have, you can deal with in different ways.

Some tries surgery. They buy themselves bigger breasts, instead of working with their self esteem.

Others use them as excuses. "Oh no, I have a too spotty face - I can´t take that fun job."

Or some tries to accept those you can´t do anything about, and work with those that are possible.

Secondly, the belief that it is always someone better out there.

Some people constantly searches for the greener grass on the other side. They are critising their partner, finding faults with him or her, comparing to others (who do the same).

It can be someones looks, habits, profession, salary, way of behavour ... and also here I am sure you can expand this list. Oddly enough, some of those things that they berate are the same that made them fall for this person in the first place. Or maybe things that they both have in common.

So, there you have the forumula:

A person who are dissatisfied with himself or herself, and dissatisfied with his or her partner.
Someone whos life is not as good as he or she imagined.

And so he or she looks for someone else. The Knight in Shining Armor. The person who will transform their grey everyday to an eternal orgasm.

Of course this will always fail.

My advice:

Accept yourself.
Accept your partner, if you are lucky enough to have one.

Of course, there are behaviour that are never acceptable. Abuse, or infidelity. Disloyalty, dishonesty.

Note: These are advices from a short, ugly, fat old man with several crashed relationships behind him. So - take it for what you may find it worth.

Translated and expanded from a post I did at the Swedish Flashback Forum
http://forum.flashback.info/scandinavia/showpost.php?p=2687168&postcount=16

I am not just anybodys friend!

No, don´t get me wrong.

I am quite friendly, trying to see good in everybody and willing to help people. I think I am easy to cooperate with. It is not hard for me to share whatever I have, knowledge, money, food, housing to people that I hardly know. I am open, open minded and optimistic.

But, I don´t have many friends. I don´t give my friendship to just anybody. There is maybe a handful of people, to whom I am saying that I am their friend.

To me - friendship is more valuable than romantic love.

When I am single, I often fall in love, it doesn´t take much.
A nice smile, an attractive face or body, a funny or charming way.

But, then I realise the futility of that.

I am not an easy person to love, and I am not that attractive, so it is probably even harder to fall in love with me. So the odds of meeting someone that I could love are low. And for them to fall in love with me are very small.

Though, but that is life. It has happened a few times, and hopefully it will again.

But for someone to earn my friendship, it is something much more fundamental than that.

These few are people that I admire, that has shown their friendship to me and that has been there when I needed them. Or, maybe they did me some big service. Maybe they never realised how big. It varies. Some of them used to be girlfriends. Some I have actually never met.

To have my friendship, means that I will be there, for the rest of my life.

If they need me - I will stop at nothing to help them.
If they want to talk, I am there to listen.
I will try to give advice - if that is what they need.

If they need a shoulder to cry on - I will be there.
If they want to joke around and have someone who understand their jokes, I will try.
Sometimes I will be saying things that they need to hear.

And I will not ever expect anything in return.

No gratitude, no reward.

Maybe this is stupid of me?
Maybe friendship doesn´t mean that to other people?
Maybe it is just another one of these empty phrases - that used to mean something, but not anymore? Another fad.

Maybe it is just something people say to make others help them? To trick stupid buggers like me?

Well, I don´t give my friendship expecting to get something back.

So what, if I will be used, abused and forgotten when someone more interesting comes along?

That is life too.

The need to be needed

I have been thinking.

Yes, I know. It is a rare event, but it does happen.

Why are everybody so involved in work, doing charity, helping out in organisations, writing on the net, chatting, going to bars, gym, bingo whatever? I mean - why are we socializing?

Examples:

- Relationships. Yes, we do satisfy a sexual need, and yes it is practical to have someone to share your expenses - but why do we fall in love? Or rather, why do we stay in love?
It is not only to care for our young. And why do women stay with men mistreating them?

- Friendships. Why do we have these? Why does it hurt when they go wrong? Yes, we have use for people to back us up when we are in trouble, and it is fun to be with a group that understand you. But sometimes friends can become your worst enemy. They know which buttons to press, they know where they can hurt you.

The bonding factor I think is our need to be needed. This is one strong urge to keep the group together, an evolutionary trait that has been wired into us since long before we became humans.

This is why we stay in marriages that gone wrong and keep friends even if they mistreat us. Because, if we cut loose all those bits - we may end up with no one needing us.

And that is a terrible feeling. To be all alone, nobody asks after you, nobody greets you with a smile, nobody is keeping in touch.

On the other hand - with each bond you have, you have also limited your freedom. And people with too many relationships, too many people needing them can start to feel trapped.

Why is it that we are so fucked up?