Take a break from all the serious discussion of technology and remember that the main reason people go onto the Internet is to keep up with the latest jokes.
Here are a couple of the better recent ones sent by “cc” from one person to another.
Salesman’s choice
There once was a software salesman who lived his life without taking advantage of any of the people he dealt with. In fact, the Sales Guy made sure that every deal was a win-win situation. One day while walking down the street, he was tragically hit by a bus and killed. His soul arrived in heaven where he was met at the Pearly Gates by St. Peter.
“Welcome to Heaven,” St. Peter said. “Before you get settled in, though, it seems we have a problem. You see, strangely enough, we’ve never had anyone in software sales make it this far and we’re not really sure what to do with you.”
“No problem, just let me in,” the Sales Guy said.
“Well, I’d like to, but I have higher orders,” St. Peter replied. “We’re going to let you have a day in hell and a day in heaven. Then you can choose where you want to spend eternity.”
St. Peter put the Sales Guy in an elevator and it went straight to hell. The doors opened and the Sales Guy found himself stepping onto the putting green of a beautiful golf course. In the distance was a country club, and standing in front of him were all his old friends, fellow Sales Guys he had worked with over the years. They were all dressed in tuxedos, beautiful women on their arms, and they were all cheering for him.
They played an excellent round of golf and at night went to the country club for a steak and lobster dinner. The devil, who was actually a really nice guy, came over and offered the Sales Guy a Cuban cigar.
The Sales Guy was having such a good time that, before he knew it, the visit was over and everybody waved goodbye as he got on the elevator.
The elevator opened up at the Pearly Gates for the Sales Guy’s day in heaven. He spent the next 24 hours lounging around on clouds, playing the harp and singing. He had a great time, and soon his 24 hours were up and St. Peter came for him.
“So, you’ve spent a day in hell and you’ve spent a day in heaven. Now you must choose your eternity,” St. Peter said.
The Sales Guy paused and then replied, “Well, I never thought I’d say this, I mean, heaven has been really great and all, but I think I had a better time in hell.”
St. Peter escorted him to the elevator and the Sales Guy went back to hell. When the elevator doors opened, he found himself standing in a desolate wasteland covered in garbage and filth. He saw his friends dressed in rags, picking up the garbage and putting it in sacks. The devil came up and put his arm around him.
“I don’t understand,” stammered the Sales Guy. “Yesterday, there was a golf course and a country club and we ate lobster and we danced and had a great time. Now there is a wasteland of garbage and all my friends look miserable.”
The devil looked at him and smiled: “That’s because yesterday you were a prospect. Today you’re a client.”
More breakthroughs
With the recent success of Viagra, the anti-impotence pill for men, an all-woman pharmaceutical company is considering a number of spin-off products. Among them:
– Directra–A dose of this drug given to men before leaving on car trips caused 72 percent of them to stop and ask directions when they got lost, compared with 0.2 percent in a control group.
– Projectra–Men given this experimental new drug were far more likely to finish a household repair project before starting a new one.
– Complimentra–In clinical trials, 82 percent of middle-aged men administered this drug noticed that their wives had a new hairstyle. Currently being tested to see if its effects extend to noticing new clothing.
– Buyagra–Married and otherwise attached men reported a sudden urge to buy their sweeties expensive jewelry and gifts after taking this drug for two days.
Poison pen
There was a farmer who raised watermelons. He was doing well, but he was disturbed by some local kids who would sneak into his melon patch at night and eat watermelons. After some careful thought, he came up with an idea to scare away the kids.
He posted a sign: “Warning, one of the watermelons in this field has been injected with cyanide.”
The farmer showed up the following day, and when he looked over the field he noticed that no watermelons were missing. But he found a new sign next to his: “Now there are two.”
Murphy’s corollaries
The original Murphy’s law said anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Now there is an additional set of Murphy’s laws for technology:
1. Technology is dominated by those who manage what they do not understand.
2. If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker that came along would destroy civilization.
3. Experts are those who know more and more about less and less until they know absolutely everything about nothing.
4. Tell a man there are 300 billion stars in the universe, and he’ll believe you. Tell him a bench has wet paint on it, and he’ll have to touch it to be sure.
5. A meeting is an event at which the minutes are kept and the hours are lost.
6. A failure will not appear until a unit has passed final inspection.
7. Any given computer program, when running, is obsolete.
