From: kormann@obiwan.bms.com (JOSEPH KORMANN)
Subject: Re: Life  3.A
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.4-b1  
Organization: Bristol Myers Squibb Pharmaceutical Research Institute
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 22:10:00 GMT

In article <".2-Sep-92.23:48:37.PDT".*.Henry_Cate_III.OSBU_North@Xerox.com>, cate3.osbu_north@xerox.com writes...
> 
> 
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>	I bought some used paint, came in the shape of a house.
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>You know those bumper stickers that say "Escape to Wisconsin"?
> 
>Well, as I understand it, they are put out by the Wisconsin board of
>tourism (whatever they call it there).  Where are they made, then?
> 
>Why, in a state prison by convicts, of course.  :-)
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>George:  ... and here's a book on Trigonometry.  You don't even
>         know what that means.
> 
>Gracie:  Oh, I do so.  Now take it by syllables.  First comes
>         "trigo", that's a horse.  And then comes "nom", that's
>         French for name.  And last "etry", you know what that
>         is.  So "Trigonometry" is a book about a French horse
>         up a tree.
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>I liked Letterman's "USA Today Poll" --- 3 out of 4 Americans make up 75% of
>the population.
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>Subject: Oxymoronic Phrase!
> 
>Heard on local newscast Sunday evening...
>"and in the Midwest, some Fourth of July plans are being dampened by the drought..."
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>"Honey, there's a salesman at the door with a mustache!"
>"Tell him I've already got one."
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>This one's attributed to Groucho Marx.
> 
>"Hey Groucho, the garbageman is at the door."
>"Tell him I don't want any."
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>With all the anti-drug messages on television lately, I was quite surprised
>to hear the announcer's comments during the Wimbelton (sp?) match this past
>weekend:
> 
>.... With all the heat this weekend it is going to be a rough match, but
>   <tennis player's name here> should have an advantage, he plays better 
>    on grass. 
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>I once bought a little container of Minced Garlic at the Food Gallery on
>Centre Ave., Shadyside.  The shelf price was something like $1.89, I don't
>really know.  The scanned price, however, was $5287.44.
> 
>I was with a bunch of my friends, all of whom were very very amused by this.
>Unfortunately, the checkout clerk and the manager were both fairly humorless,
>and didn't appreciate our comments.
> 
>  "Bad garlic crop this year?"
>  "Gee, I better really enjoy this garlic bread tonight."
>  "Do you take the American Express Gold Card?"
>  "Only fifty-two hundred?  I'll take two."
>  "Reaganomics."
>  "Do you have change for a ten thousand?"
>  "Hmm.  Garlic bread tonight, or a new car?"
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>Summer:  long days, warm sun, good books.  Here's to it!
> 
>There are some people who read too much:  the bibliobibuli.  I know some
>who are constantly drunk on books, as other men are drunk on whiskey or religion.
> They wander through this most diverting and stimulating of worlds in a haze,
>seeing nothing and hearing nothing.
>	--H.L. Mencken
> 
>A house without books is like  room without windows.
>	-- Horace Mann
> 
>All that Mankind has done, thought, gained or been, it is lying as in magic
>preservation in the pages of books.  They are the choicest possessions of men.
>	-- Thomas Carlyle
> 
>La vrai disette, c'est l'absence de livres.
>Real poverty is lack of books.
>	-- Colette
> 
>When I speak of being in contact with my books, I mean it literally.  I like
>to be able to lean my head against them . . . .
>	-- Leigh Hunt
> 
>All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they had really happened . . . .
>	--Ernest Hemingway
> 
>Whenever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings.
>	--Heinrich Heine
> 
>For hym was levere have at his beddes heed
>Twenty bookes, clad in blak or reed,
>Of Aristotle and his philosphie,
>Than robes riche, or fithele, or gay sautrie,
>But al be that he was a philsophre,
>Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre.
>	-- Geoffrey Chaucer
> 
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>TEXACO TRIES TITILLATING TECHNIQUE
> 
>The financially troubled Texaco company told Renegade News it plans to
>tap a new market in an effort to bring their balance sheet into the
>black.  All service stations in the thirteen state drought-stricken
>area of the nation will be converted from selling gasoline to selling
>tap water.
> 
>Water will come in three varieties, similar to the gas they will
>replace.
> 
>REGULAR water will be equivalent to the water in residential homes.
> 
>A MID-GRADE water, to help plants grow faster, will have a higher
>phosphate base like the water that leaves your washing machine.
> 
>And a HIGH TEST water will be similar to water taken from the cooling
>towers at your nearby nuclear power plant.
> 
> 
>In a related story, Yuppies from all over the country are sending in
>their Perrier brand water to the nation's farming belt to help fight
>the drought. Farmers appreciate the bottled water effort, but noted one
>side effect.  Last week, several cows in one man's stockyard had the
>urge to steal a BMW and drive recklessly across Nebraska.
> 
>RENEGADE NEWS -- The News We Twist To Fit {tm}
>06/16/88
> 
>----------------------------------------------------
> 
>                           ALICE in DIGITALand
> 
>"Where am  I?"  asked  Alice,  as she peered at the large 7-lettered sign
>with the standard blue letters.
> 
>"You're in Digitaland,"  replied  the  security  guard,  "May  I see your
>badge?"
> 
>"I don't have a badge."
> 
>"Did you lose it?"
> 
>"No." answered Alice in  a  puzzled  tone.  "How could I lose something I
>never had?"
> 
>"If it's not lost then you must show it to me."
> 
>"I can't.  I don't have one."
> 
>"Then you'll have to have a temporary."
> 
>"A temporary what?" asked Alice, more confused then ever.
> 
>"A temporary Badge.  What's your badge number?" requested the guard.
> 
>"I don't have one"
> 
>"Of course not, Ken Olsen has 1.  Give me  your  badge  number,  and your
>cost center"
> 
>"I'm so confused.  I can't do this. I've already said 3  times why.  Do I
>have to tell you 4?"
> 
>"Ahhh.  3XY, badge number 4.    You  must  be very important to have such
>a low badge number.  I should have immediately recognized how low by your
>state of extreme confusion. Here's your temporary.  Go right on in."
> 
>Alice pasted the sticky paper to her dress and headed down the hall.  Not
>10 feet ahead she saw a rather distressed looking  rabbit  coming  toward
>her.   He was dressed in a pair of torn,  faded  jeans,  and  a dirty tee
>shirt.  
> 
>"What's wrong?" Alice asked.
> 
>"I'm late!  I'm late!" exclaimed the rabbit as he peered at the pert chart    
>dangling from his pocket protector.
> 
>"Late for what?" asked Alice.
> 
>"My date.  I'm going to miss my date.  I've got  a  deadline  to meet and
>I'm not going to make it."
> 
>"Well,  if  it's  already dead, it probably won't mind.  In fact it  isn't
>likely  to be going too far in such a state.  I'm sure that however  long
>you take will be just fine."
> 
>"You obviously don't understand.  Everything  takes longer than it really
>does.  It  doesn't  matter  what  you  are doing, only that you meet your
>date, and that's always impossible."
> 
>"Well if its impossible, why  would anyone expect you to meet it?" Almost
>at once regretting that she had  asked.    Was  this  was  going to be as
>confusing as badges?
> 
>"Its really very simple.  In order to move forward, you need a goal.  Any
>goal will  do.    It  just  has  to be impossible to do.  To motivate the
>troops, you have  to  make goals very challenging.  Its really only there
>to get a stake  in  the  ground,  you  know.  After that we march in step
>until we reach our objective.    The  date  really doesn't mean anything.
>You simple have to understand that we are going to do the right thing."
> 
>"But  the if the goal is impossible, and really doesn't mean anything why
>are you trying to go there.   Wouldn't it be simpler to first figure out
>what you are really going to do, then figure out how to get there?"
> 
>"You obviously don't understand the process.   And  as  I said before I'm
>late so there is obviously only one thing to do."
> 
>"Hurry up and rush off?" Alice asked, hoping it  would  sound more like a
>suggestion than a question.
> 
>"No.  No.  No.  A meeting.  Let find  the  Mad  Manager  and  a number of
>involved, interested, or warm bodies."
> 
>"That will obviously take a lot of time.  I don't think  you  have any to
>waste.
> 
>"No it won't.  All we have to do is find a conference  room.    There are
>lots of them right over here."
> 
>"But,"  started  Alice,  "those rooms are all full of people.  Don't we
>need an empty conference room?"
> 
>"Silly thought.   If  we  want to find the Mad Manager and some meeting
>attendees, why would we  look  in  an empty conference room?  Anyway, its
>impossible to ever find an empty conference room."
> 
>The rabbit took Alice by  the  hand,  and  promptly  lead  her  into  the
>largest,  fullest conference room.  Alice  immediately  noticed  that  the
>wastebasket was quite full of foam cups,  and  overhead  projector bulbs.
>These people had obviously been here for a long time.
> 
>At the head of the table sat a  man  with  a  rather funny suit wearing a
>large hat.
> 
>"Why" whispered Alice to the rabbit, "is that man wearing that funny hat?
>Who is he?"
> 
>"I'm  the  Mad  Manager,"  answered  the  man  at the end of  the  table,
>obviously  overhearing the question, " And I'll be happy to tell you  why
>I'm wearing this Hat, but that topic is not on the agenda."
> 
>"Why don't we change the agenda?" asked a person in the corner.
> 
>"Is that a topic for another meeting?" replied the manager.
> 
>"Is  what  a topic for another meeting?" voiced a third.  "The reason for
>the hat, or why we don't change the agenda?"
> 
>"Why don't we take this off line?" queried another.
> 
>"Does everyone  agree that these are all topics we should address?" asked
>the mad manager.
> 
>"Possibly so.  " injected the person in the corner.  "Could it be that we
>have a hidden agenda?"
> 
>"Oh no!" the Mad  Manager began, the dismay obvious on his face, "someone
>has hidden the agenda again!  Let me put on my process hat and we'll see
>if we can work this issue."
> 
>With that, he removed his rather  amusing  top hat, and place a big green
>fedora on his head.
> 
>"Now, with my process hat on, I'd like to address the issue of the hidden
>agenda.  Since we can't have a productive meeting without an agenda, it
>is up to all of us to find it."
> 
>"But, " a voice from the corner piped in,  "who  is  going  to drive this
>issue?"
> 
>"Do we have an action item here?" asked another attendee.
> 
>"Does anyone here want to work this?" asked the mad manager.
> 
>"Who originally brought this up?" asked another.
> 
>"I  believe that the woman who came in with the  rabbit  proposed  this.
>Shouldn't she own it?"
> 
>"Well" the Manager stated, pointing to Alice.  "I'd say that this is your
>issue."
> 
>"What  issue.    I  don't  have  any issues.  " retorted Alice, nervously
>fingering her temporary badge. "I only posed a simple question."
> 
>"I'm not  sure  we  can  accept  that," the manager declared.  "We need a
>date."
> 
>"But, " Alice began,  remembering what the rabbit told her about dates,
>"a date is impossible."
> 
>>From the back of the  room  another  voice asked, "How about a date for a
>date?"
> 
>"The least we can ask it that you give us a date when you will be able to
>give us the date for the date."  stated the person in the corner.
> 
>"I'm not sure I can do  that," Alice opened, "since I don't know what I'm
>supposed to give you a date for.    I'm having a problem trying to figure
>out what you want me to do."
> 
>"We don't have any problems here, only opportunities!"  Piped a chorus of
>voices.
> 
>"It's  really  quite  obvious,"  the mad manager declared as  he  reached
>behind him for a striped blue and gray beret, "let  me  put on my Digital
>hat  for a moment," he continued doffing the fedora and flipping  on  his
>latest selection, "You must do the right thing."
> 
>"Yes. yes. " chimed the chorus of attendees, "Do the right thing.
> 
>"Now,  who  is  keeping the minutes?" the manager asked as he pitched the
>beret  and  placed the fedora back on his head.  "We need to record  this
>action item so we can come back to it later."
> 
>"We obviously can't  deal  with  this  issue until we can determine whose
>meeting this is?" 
> 
>"Should we schedule some time to  cover  that  topic?"  asked  one of the
>attendees.
> 
>"Whose going to drive this?" asked another.
> 
>Just at the Mad Manager was pulling  out  a  rather  worn  pith helmet, a
>voice in the back suggested "Let's take a break and work some of this 1x1
>off line"
> 
>Being closest to the door Alice was the first  to  leave.    She  quickly
>dashed  down  the  hall,  and  ran  up  the first flight  of  stairs  she
>encountered, relieved to be free of the madness.
> 
>When  she  opened the door the scene that confronted her made her wonder if
>returning to  the  meeting wasn't a bad idea.  Seated around a large oval
>table were what  appeared  to be playing cards, each dressed in a gray or
>navy blue three piece  suit.   Around each neck was a rather oddly shaped
>handle (or were they nooses?) made of silk, or polyester.
> 
>"Off with her head!" screamed the queen of hearts who was  sitting at the
>head of the table.  Alice noticed that her tie was silk,  and  each  card
>seated  near  her  was dressed in a suit and noose combination similar to
>the queen's.
> 
>"Why would you want to remove my head?" Alice asked.  By now she was 
>feeling beyond confused.
> 
>"It's  not  a  modern,  iconic,  user  friendly, menu driven,  color,  PC
>compatible user interface," replied the queen, in a tone that  would need
>to come up two notches to be vaguely considered condescending.
> 
>"It happens to suit me just fine," retorted Alice.
> 
>"What are you an engineer or something?" asked the 7 of spades.
> 
>"No, I'm Alice.  Who are you?"  
> 
>"Marketing." they replied in perfect fifty-two part harmony.
> 
>"And what is that?" asked Alice.
> 
>There was a brief interlude of silence as each of the cards fidgeted with
>their ties, checked their watches  and  scribbled  notes  on  the pads of
>paper contained in a handsome genuine  imitation  leather folder embossed
>with the company logo.  Then one  by  one,  as  dominoes  would  do, they
>turned to the person on the left until  they  all  stared at the queen of
>hearts.
> 
>The queen  cleared  her throat, adjusted her tie a second time and stared
>directly at Alice.   "We provide the strategic thinking necessary to grow
>the business."  
> 
>"Oh," said Alice, "you figure out what products to build!"
> 
>"Heavens, no!" exclaimed the Queen, "That's too tactical.  We feel its our
>job to develop the vision for the long term."
> 
>"You develop things," began Alice, "so you build the products?"
> 
>In unison each member of the table made a face reminiscent of the look a
>small child gets upon tasting spoiled dead roaches for the first time.
> 
>"Uggggh, that's even more tactical," jeered the chorus.
> 
>"No!  No!" shouted the Queen.  "You still do not understand.  We take the
>pulse of the key market leaders demand curve."
> 
>"I see now." said Alice, "You sell the products."
> 
>By  now the chorus of  cards  chanting  "Tac-ti-cal!    Tac-ti-cal!"  was
>becoming too much.  
> 
>The queen was furious and repeated her  original greeting.  "Off with her
>head!  Off With her head"
> 
>"WAIT!" demanded Alice.  "I believe I understand.  You are all responsible
>for  driving  the  solution  opportunities  for  the  key  client  supply
>perceptions  through  strategic vision management!" 
> 
>Alice wondered if she should  add something about the claws catching, and
>frumious bandersnatches and thought that she'd  best  leave  it  at  that
>before she became ill.
> 
>"Yes," screamed the cards, "That's exactly right!"
> 
>"And how, might I ask, do you accomplish these lofty and important goals?"
> 
>"By calling a BOD," the queen responded.
> 
>"And what, pray tell, might that be?"  inquired  Alice  as she looked for
>the quickest escape route, hoping that this jabber  would  keep  her head
>attached long enough to get out.
> 
>"A Board of Directors", began the queen, just as Alice  noticed  the door
>to the left of the table.  "Its a type of high level meeting."
> 
>"A meeting????!!!!" exclaimed Alice.  "Not  another  meeting!"  With that
>she bolted for the door, no longer  fearing  for her head.  Her only hope
>was that she make it through before the  agenda  hit the overhead.  In a
>dead run, she passed through the door just as  the projector lamp flicked
>on.  The sound of the fan was the last sound to fade as the door closed.
> 
>Breathlessly she looked up to see a large open area.  Directly in front of
>her was an enclosed area lined on one side with triple  chrome  table.  A
>stack of plastic trays was at the foyer.
> 
>As she wandered through an assortment of sandwiches, prepared foods,
>soft drinks and  salad began their daily spiel.  "Eat Me!  Drink Me!  Eat
>Me!"
> 
>"Oh no," answered Alice,  "I may know nothing about dates, and problems and
>meetings and agendas, and marketing  and badges, but I do know food.  I'm
>not gonna touch any of you.   After the morning I've had I deserve a nice
>cheese steak (no lettuce)!"
> 
>With that, Alice opened the  nearest  exit  door  and left.  A resounding
>high pitched whine sang its midday good-byes as Alice returned to the real
>world.
> 
>