HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: asteroids beyond Jupiter
Date: 22 Dec 92 23:54:20 GMT
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Company, Corvallis, Oregon USA

jfurr@polaris.async.vt.edu (Joel K. Furr) writes:
: In article <1992Dec22.185915.27317@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com> billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson) writes:
: >: 
: >: Well, stay tuned.  Object 1992QB1 is reckoned to be a good candidate for a
: >: distant (40-50 A.U.) minor planet and may be the first of many discovered at
: >: that distance.
: >
: >The statement was asteroid - not planetoid. The asteroids originate in the
: >asteroid belt. It is doubtful if any of them could be perturbed enough to
: >reach the orbit if Neptune.
: >
: >The planetoids are a different matter. It is possible that some of them
: >came from outside the Solar System. They could also have been formed just
: >about anywhere in the system, so the same limitations do not apply to
: >them. I would not argue that a planetoid could not have been captured
: >by Neptune - although the fact that Pluto has a moon makes this very
: >unlikely.
: 
: No, Bill, you're wrong.  There are many flat-out ASTEROIDS that orbit that
: far.  You're not an astronomer, don't lecture us from a vacuum of knowledge.

I could easily be wrong. This is AFU - after all.

Guess I will have to do some study of the recent research. Do you have some
cites to simplify my astronomical task?

Bill
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: hoey@AIC.NRL.Navy.Mil (Dan Hoey)
Subject: Re: Dead Cat
Organization: Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 19:19:15 GMT

rrd@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM (Ray Depew) writes:

> ... I heard it from a friend of ours, at a party.

One.

> I've never known her to lie, 

Two.

> and for all I know, it really did happen.

Three.

> In any case, it was a great story,....

Four.  I was told there was a prize for most AFU slogans in
succession.

> Aunt and cousin got inside the mall just in time to see the guy stop and open
> the bag for a look inside.  When he saw what was in the bag, he dropped it 
> and fainted dead away.  Hit his head on the hard tile floor, too.  Out cold.

> Somebody called 911, and soon an ambulance crew came rushing in.  They 
> checked the poor guy, and decided to haul him to the hospital.  So they
> gently put him on the gurney, placed his shopping bag on his chest, and
> wheeled him out.  End of story.

> Well?

Well, you left out the last part of the story, where the AACOAF tell
the ambulance crew what happened, and the crew breaks out laughing so
hard they drop the patient, breaking his leg.

Then there's an optional last verse about how after he recovers he
sues the ambulance crew, the aunt, the cousin, the mall, and the
manufacturer of the bag for battery and cruelty and wrongful surprise
and misuse of a corpse.

Dan Hoey
Hoey@AIC.NRL.Navy.Mil
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.config
From: twpierce@unix.amherst.edu (Tim Pierce)
Subject: Re: alt.dev.null.mnemonics?
Organization: Elitist Usenet Administrators, Stuff and Nonsense Division
Date: Sat, 26 Dec 1992 12:31:45 GMT

Get a life, Joel.

-- 
____ Tim Pierce                / 
\  / twpierce@unix.amherst.edu /               Rocks say goodbye.
 \/ (BITnet: TWPIERCE@AMHERST) / 
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: fehr@ms.uky.edu (Jeff Davis)
Subject: Re: The El
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 1992 17:12:46 GMT
Organization: Austerlitz, Gershovitz, and Carmichael

In article <92356.102137MIWHC@CUNYVM.BITNET> <MIWHC@CUNYVM.BITNET> writes:
>What to do with
>the steel? It turns out NYC put all of it on several cargo ships and sold
>all of it to Japan, who was HUNGERING for all the precious steel they could
>get for their various war plans, including China.

Fabled in song and story. This even made it into a poem by e.e.cummings.

-- 
Jeff Davis <davis@keats.ca.uky.edu> One never knows, do one?
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson)
Subject: Re: Federal Reserve Notes (Re: I Live to FAQ!)
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Company, Corvallis, Oregon USA
Date: Sat, 2 Jan 1993 09:17:39 GMT

bill@extro.ucc.su.OZ.AU (William Logan Lee) writes:
: 
: But, can I still go into a Federal Reserve Bank with my US$1 Silver
: Certificate and cash it in for US$1 of silver (Ag) metal?

Nope. That offer expired some time in the 1970s. Now, it is worth
no more than the current $1 bills - except as possible collector
value for some rare issues.

Bill
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: dtasman@NMSU.edu (Dan Tasman)
Subject: Re: Amusing street names
Organization: New Mexico State University
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 01:36:56 GMT

Bruce.Tindall@launchpad.unc.edu (Bruce Tindall) writes:

: BTW, are there any ULs or even (horrors!) facts about how "Great Jones
: Street" in New York got its name?  Was there a person referred to as 
: "Great Jones," or is the street distinguished from a lesser street
: of the same name?  There is a one-block "Great Jones Street" in 
: Durham, N.C., too; nothing is on it anymore, but they keep the sign
: up anyway.

Just about every city and town in New Mexico somewhere has a "Princess Jeanne  
Lane".  Supposedly, a developer that built in just about every community in New  
Mexico had a daughter named Jeanne, and he 

Some actual street names in regions outlying Las Cruces, before Dona Ana County  
adopted a street naming ordinance ...

* "Fat Katy Lane"
* "Bar-b-que Lane"
* "No Name Street"
* Eight streets named "Barela Road" in various locations, Barela being a proper  
name and not meaning "Thank You", "One Way" or anything like that.

My favorite is in the little town of Mesilla ... "Calle de Nuestra de la  
Senorita de Guadalupe."  Huge sign ... twice as high as a normal street sign.   
Is there anything longer in the United States (Mexican street names describing  
entire battles, i.e. Avenida de Revolucion de 14 Junio de 1874 de Juarez y  
Muertos con Borracherrenos y Mujers Gordo Solidaridad y excepted).  

--
   Dan Tasman                                       dtasman@dante.nmsu.edu
                                                     molson@rever.nmsu.edu
   -----------------------------------------------------------------------
   "I think that I shall never see a billboard lovely as a tree
    Indeed, unless the billboards fall, I'll never see a tree at all."
                                                                Ogden Nash
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: PAPAI@kcgl1.eng.ohio-state.edu (Jonathan Papai)
Subject: Re: alzheimer's and Aluminum pots and pans
Organization: The Ohio State University
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 1992 00:18:54 GMT

	I was reading a trade-mag. over the holidays, and the
following grabbed my attention.  From _Die Casting Engineer_,
Nov/Dec, 1992, p. 60.:

No evidence found to link Alzheimer's to Aluminum

.....	In an effort to determine if there is any connection
between aluminum and Alzheimer's disease, the aluminum industry
and The Aluminum Association have sponsored medical research for
more than 10 years.  The association has also reviewed the
world's literature on health effects of aluminum and its
compounds.
...............................................

	It personally re-assures me that a bunch of metallurgists
reviewed the literature.  I think they hired the same doctors to
research the disease that the tobacco industry uses.  Furrfu

ObUL: In England, it's spelled aluminium.

Jon "Metallurgist, not medical doctor." Papai
From: dannyb@panix.com (Daniel Burstein)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: extreme strength (was: mom lifting car..)
Date: 29 Dec 92 18:59:26 GMT
Organization: Panix, NYC

As a paramedic in NYC I can relate from personal experience feets, umm,
make that feats, of strength which are quite extreme.
  
One of our more worrisome calls is dealing with a patient who is in a
(usually) drug induced psychotic, i.e. crazily mad and violent, state. 
(no flames please about the imprecise language, I'm writing this for the
normal? folk in netland)
  
Visualize a person being held down flat on the floor by five people (one
on each arm and leg, one on the center), then watch as this person
cheerfully raises said arm, with 200 pound paramedic sitting on it.  watch
paramedic thrown into the air.

Yep, this is one I personally (and probably just about every other
emergency medical or law enforcement person) can relate to.

Hmm, let's see how this equates into a car:  figure that to lift a car off
someone you need approx 750 lbs of lift (a typical car these days weighs
about 3,000 pounds, but you're shifting weight onto the other wheels..)
  
can a person lift this much? It wouldn't surprise me.  Have I ever seen
this? no.  But again, I've seen things that come pretty close. 

Ever carry someone on your back?  Figure on that being 200 pounds.  Ever
pull someone up a climbing rope or ladder?  well, that's your two hundred,
plus their two hundred.  

danny 

<dannyb@panix.com>    <dburstein@mcimail.com>
From: twcaps@tennyson.lbl.gov (Terry Chan)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Trademarks
Date: 22 Dec 1992 06:13:38 GMT
Organization: Department of Redundancy Department
Reply-To: TWChan@lbl.gov (Terry Chan)
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.12.117

infidel@cislabs.pitt.edu (todd j. derr) writes:

  +: > I haven't been this steamed since the last time a megacorp highjacked
  +: > a common term, when IBM (in my mind, illegally) trademarked the
  +: > acronym for "personal computer."
  
billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson) writes:

  +Nope. Todd is either trolling, or very confused. There is no way to
  +trademark a commonly used term. For example, Bayer lost their "aspirin"
  +trademank due to common usage.

Indeed.  A perusal of the November 30, 1992 _PC Week_ shows
several ads referring to IBM personal computers.  The first,
on pp. 64-65 talks about the new IBM series which is called
"PS/ValuePoint".  The IBM trademarks in that article include 
"IBM", "OS/2", "PS/2", "PS/ValuePoint", "ThinkPad", "HelpWare",
and "386/SLC"."  Further, there is a Gateway 2000 ad on pp. 132
and 133 and a Microsoft ad (not to mention the name of the
publication itself) which uses the acronym without any recognition
of IBM's "trademark."

Terry [tm] Chan
--
Energy and Environment Division   | Internet:  TWChan@lbl.gov
Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory      | 
Berkeley, California  USA  94720  | Carpe per diem
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: obrien@netcom.com (Oh!   It's ... YOU)
Subject: Re: kpix SCREWS UP (was Re:    Skyscraper FALLS DOWN.)
Organization: Netcom Online Communications Services (408-241-9760 login: guest)
Date: Wed, 30 Dec 1992 10:21:09 GMT

Bruce.Tindall@launchpad.unc.edu (Bruce Tindall) writes:
>obrien@netcom.com (Robert O'Brien) writes:
>>ObUL: Dan Quayle's law degree was partially chewed up by the dog
>>	Bob "just heard that on KPIX" O'Bob
>
>I was watching KPIX-TV news on Dec. 31, 1983, when the ignorant blow-dried
>newscreature mentioned that we were about to start the year 1984, in which
>(he said), George Orwell warned us that computers would be a danger to the
>world, blah blah blah.  Of course, anyone who's ever read _1984_ knows 
[otherwise]
>
>So "heard that on KPIX" should be a contender for AFU motto-of-the-whatever.
>


No argument on that from me, though they did seem to be stating this
from some source having to do with establishing an exhibit of Quayle
"memorabilia" so it may be possible to verify *this* "factoid"


ObUL: the "word" 'factoid' was in use before there was a CNN

	Bob O'Bob
--
From: JTCHEW@lbl.gov (Ad absurdum per aspera)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Why care what percentage?  (was: Gay Likelihood)
Followup-To: alt.folklore.urban
Date: 21 Dec 1992 14:59:57 GMT
Organization: Honest Ernie's Used Ions
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.252.152

In article <1992Dec21.084939.19583@netcom.com>, obrien@netcom.com (Robert
O'Brien) wrote:

> What I'm wondering is, does it make a difference to you?  If, say, 2% of
> the population is all, then would that excuse ignoring or discriminating
> against a group?  If 20% of the population were gay, then they'd be
> a lot harder to ignore eh? 

Well... that's *my* point, kind of, in explaining why the number seems
to have taken on some political importance.  A homophobe isn't 
forced to confront his prejudices if he thinks there are 1 or 2 gay people 
in 100.  There are surely 1 or 2 people in 100 he doesn't like anyway,
and in whom he can see "effeminate" or at least off-normal characteristics 
if he looks  creatively enough.  If the proportion  is widely assumed to be

10% or 20%, though, he has to confront the idea that there might be a
homosexual in the room with him right now -- maybe even someone he 
likes and probably someone who "doesn't look gay."  

That may be less than the ideal motivation for confronting fear of
homosexuals, but it's better than nothing.  And it doesn't take a
folklorist of Brunvandian proportions to see how this motivation would help
a possibly bogus number take on a life of its own.

Joe
"Just another personal opinion from the People's Republic of Berkeley"
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.urban:31949 rec.arts.startrek.misc:13005 talk.bizarre:42816
From: twcaps@tennyson.lbl.gov (Terry Chan)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,rec.arts.startrek.misc,talk.bizarre
Subject: Re: Walking Between Rain Drops !!!!
Date: 23 Dec 1992 04:52:51 GMT
Organization: Department of Redundancy Department
Distribution: usa
Reply-To: TWChan@lbl.gov (Terry Chan)
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.12.117

Old, crusty, hardened carnivore Dwight Tovey admonishes young, brash 
quiche eater Bruce Sarte:
  +
  +Guess we can figure out who the meathead was.
  +
  +Really Bruce, I don't know where you had originally intended to post
  +that article, but it looks to me from the newsgroups that it did make
  +it to that you should expect a lot of flip answers.  I don't know
  +about rec.arts.startrek.misc or talk.bizarre, but the folks on
  +alt.folklore.urban are notorious for their total lack of respect.  I
  +haven't seen anything that really justifies you getting bent out of
  +shape.

Total lack of respect on a.f.u.?  Who the hell are you, damn it?
If I want to hear some idiotic opinion like that, I'll tell you!

Pah!  This is all useless drivel.  Let's get back to quality 
stuff like we get on talk.bizarre or alt.religion.kibology.


Terry "R00LZ" Chan
--
Energy and Environment Division   | Internet:  TWChan@lbl.gov
Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory      | 
Berkeley, California  USA  94720  | Carpe per diem
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,rec.nude,alt.religion.kibology,alt.slack,alt.conspiracy,alt.d
From: billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson)
Subject: Re: Driving without shoes
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Company, Corvallis, Oregon USA
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 1992 21:04:20 GMT

system@codewks.nacjack.gen.nz (Wayne McDougall) writes:
: 
: > procedure to do an emergency stop is to apply pressure initially as in normal
: > braking and then increase the pressure until you are braking very hard. If yo
: > lock the wheels you should take pressure off the brake pedal and then re-appl
: > pressure as before.
: 
: Agreed. That is what I would do if I was NOT slowing down.

That is what you should be doing - any time you are not slowing down fast
enough. You will slow down, even when skidding - only not as fast as if your
wheels were not locked.

: > %In summary, I want to be in a position where I can apply maximum force to
: > %the brakes.
: > 
: > You ought to have some driving lessons - you might learn something that'll 
: > save someone else's life! When you've had the lessons, then you can start
: > telling people how to drive.
: 
: Well give me a brake. I was not telling people how to drive. I was saying
: that wearing shoes means that I can put my foot down hard on the brake
: without worrying about it curling up because of some reflex action.

That reflex action is going to be overridden in a panic situation. 

: Furthermore, in the incident I cited (which you have failed to quote), I
: DID brake as hard as I could, the wheels did NOT lock, and I did stop less

Then - either you have anti-skid brakes, or your brakes are defective. If
it is the latter, you should get them checked - before they fail completely.

: than a metre from this idiot on the wrong side of the road [who was also
: stopping thank goodness]. I COORECTLY assess that I did not have time to
: apply pressure initially as in normal braking as you suggest. If I had done
: as you suggest, I would certainly have crashed. I can cite other accidents
: where [quote from police report] "the driver must have literally stood on
: his brakes" for example, immediately.

The officers usually state that - when there are skid marks. All it means is
that the person was attempting to make a panic stop. It says nothing at all
about how efficient/effective that effort was.

: So what's your problem?

The implication that you can "stand on the breaks" and stop in the shortest
distance. There are only two times when that is true - if you have anti-skid
brakes or if you have defective brakes.

Bill
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: norlin@midway.ecn.uoknor.edu (Norman Lin)
Subject: Trademarks (was Re: ...film at 11...)
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1992 02:01:50 GMT
Organization: Engineering Computer Network, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA


billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson) writes:
: 
: There is no way to
: trademark a commonly used term. For example, Bayer lost their "aspirin"
: trademank due to common usage.

Is that right?  Well, I have a can of Lipton Iced Tea (bought out of the
coke machine), and it says:

"Brisk (tm) Iced Tea"

which seems to imply they have a trademark on (of all things) the word
"Brisk."  Ludicrous, yes, but there is the "tm" subscripted right below
the word "Brisk" and before the word "Iced."  Bizarre.

Norman Lin
norlin@mailhost.ecn.uoknor.edu
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,rec.arts.startrek.misc,talk.bizarre
From: dwight@devnet.la.locus.com (Dwight Tovey)
Subject: Re: Walking Between Rain Drops !!!!
Reply-To: dwight@locus.com
Organization: Locus Computing Corporation
Distribution: usa
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 16:41:58 GMT

In article <28123@dog.ee.lbl.gov>, twcaps@tennyson.lbl.gov (Terry Chan) writes:
|> Old, crusty, hardened carnivore Dwight Tovey admonishes young, brash 
|> quiche eater Bruce Sarte:

Wait a minute.  Where do you get off calling me names like that?  I change my
underwear at least once a week.

"Crusty" indeed!

	/dwight
-- 
  Dwight Tovey                          | I didn't claw my way to the top of
  Locus Computing Corp.	                | the food chain to eat vegetables.
  (310)337-5978	                        |~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  Internet:     dwight@locus.com        | The views I express are entirely my
  UUCP:         ...!uunet!lcc!dwight    | own and do not in any way represent
  MIL/BITNET:   dwight%lcc@UUNET.UU.NET	| those of Locus Computing.
From: sasbmt@jjoyce.unx.sas.com (Bruce Tindall)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Trademarks (was Re: ...film at 11...)
Date: 22 Dec 92 22:03:31 GMT
Organization: SAS Institute Inc.
Originator: sasbmt@jjoyce.unx.sas.com


Re "Olympic committee has trademarked the 5 rings":  There is an
"Olympic Restaurant" in Georgetown, Washington, D.C., just off
Wisconsin Ave., which has a 4-ring symbol on its marquee.  It has
been very obviously altered from an original 5-ring symbol.  I
assume some Olympic Committee official passed by it one day and
threatened them with fire, brimstone, and legal action.

Re "trademarks are context sensitive":  Must be true, because SAS
airline coexists peacefully with SAS Inst. (the software company),
which uses "SAS" as a registered trademark.

Re trademarks in general:  anybody can CLAIM a trademark, just by
putting "tm" after the alleged trademark.  The Scudder financial
institution claims a "tm" on the phrase "pure no-load" for its
mutual funds.  But many other financial institutions, as well as
journalists, use this phrase with respect to other specific funds
(and generically).  I doubt that an attempt by Scudder to enforce
its alleged "tm" would succeed.  If you register your trademark with
the U.S. Patent Office you can put the "(R)" after your trademark.
Competitors can still challenge it, but registration shifts the
burden of proof of primacy, ownership, etc., from the trademark-
claimer to the trademark-challenger.
-- 
Bruce Tindall, Core Testing Mgr., SAS Institute Inc., Cary, N.C. 27513
From: ALI00BAW@UNCCVM.UNCC.EDU
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: ethnicity & soc.secu
Date: 31 Dec 92 15:55:53 GMT
Organization: UNC Charlotte

In article <n134bt@ofa123.fidonet.org>
Larry.Mc.Donald@ofa123.fidonet.org writes:
 
>
>  <MIWHC@CUNYVM.BITNET>
>
>> The story I heard is that the 1950s era government rigged the social
>> security system so that any government agent or knowledgeable employer
>> or banker could tell the ethnicity of someone by the middle two
>> numbers. An -06-, -52-, -32-, -12- or any other EVEN middle number
>> belongs to Blacks, Hispanics, Jews, Asians, etc. Any ODD middle number
>> (e.g.  -67-, -43-, -07-) shows its owner to be a WASP of reasonably
>> pure upbringing. I asked around and could find very few odd middle
>> numbers. My results:
>> * EVERY even-numbered peson was either, Black, Hispanic, Jewish,
>> Asian, Roman Catholic, Greek, or other Eastern European.
>> * EVERY odd-numbered person I found was white. A few were half
>> Jewish or half Roman Catholic.
>
>   I was born a roman catholic and I have an odd (41) number. My
>wife is Indonesian and is also odd (77) {No comments!}.
>
>
>
>
>
>... Larry.Mc.Donald, N6ZMB, Fullerton, California!  <cough, cough>
>___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.10
>
>--- Maximus 2.01wb
From: dannyb@panix.com (Daniel Burstein)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: body in college rug
Keywords: legend
Date: 26 Dec 92 21:35:44 GMT
Organization: Panix, NYC

One of the FAQ stories involves some people picking up a rug from the
garbage, bringing it home, and finding a body in it.
  
I hate to use the phrase, but this one ACTUALLY HAPPENED.  Yes, and I was
(almost) there.

In 1985 give or take a year, some college students from Carman Hall,
Columbia College (NYC) pulled a rug out of a dumpster (quick side
question: is dumpster a trademerk?) and brought it upstarirs.  Yep, there
was a body in it.

Made quite a hit in the news at teh time, too.

I was assigned to a different Emergency medical Service unit at the time,
so didn't go on the call, but I certainly remember it going out, and we
all kidded the crew who had the removal detail...

danny

<dannyb@panix.com>  <dburstein@mcimail.com>
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: mbrousse@cs.ulowell.edu (Marc Brousseau)
Subject: Re: zebras - why are they striped?
Organization: University of Massachusetts at Lowell Computer Science
Date: Sat, 2 Jan 1993 18:33:40 GMT

>Anyway, one of the things they demonstrated was the use of the
>"Razzle-Dazzle" painting schemes used by ships at teh end of the Great War
>(also known as WW 1).  To the vast amazement of eveyone involved (except
>the proponenets of the scheme), painting ships with large more or less
>randomized splotches of black and white actually made them HARDER to locate.
>                                                                     ^^^^^^
Not quite. It made it harder for the submarine captain, observing through
a periscope, to estimate the range to the target, and then applying
the proper lead for the torpedoes.