F.A.D.

Funnies Acronym Dictionary

Howdy, Fans!
    Maybe it's because of the speed of modern life, but our
modern, high-tech world is overflowing with acronyms and
abbreviations.  RADAR, MTV, HTML, SCUBA, NASA, LASER - no one has
the time too spell out what these mean, and the initials or
acronym take on a life on their own.  And there's just no
avoiding them.
     Even TV and movies get into the act, with "Men In Black"
being known as much by initials as by its full name.  And TV
shows do it, too.  Take the popular doctor show "ER."  Even the
title is an abbreviation.  Now there's a TV program that never
uses a complete word when a technical sounding acronym will do:

          "Doctor!  The C.F.D. pulled this DWI VIP out of
     his BMW after he'd run it into an ATM doing at least 50
     MPH.  The EMT's have started CPR and an IV.

          "OK, get his ID and take his BP, then set up for a CAT
     scan, if his HMO will pay for it..."

     Then there's government.  Every government department or
program has to have some kind of acronymic name, no matter how
far they have to reach to make the letters fit.  And the military
just lives for acronyms.  
     A little bit of old business...  Those of you who wrote to
remind me that the new millennium starts on January 1, 2001:
thanks for the good work, but I thought I'd avoided saying
"millennium" and "2000" together last week.  I do know that there
was no year 0, so the year 2000 is only 1,999 years from where we
Westerners started counting.  Millennium and 2000 got pretty
close in Funnies at one point, though - maybe too close.  It is
worth pointing out that Webster's gives the first definition of
millennium as, "any period of a thousand years."  And the
speedometer-effect rollover from x999 to x000 does only happen
"Once Every Millennium, Or So."  Trust me, you'll see this
mistake all over in a few months.  It has something to do with
all of those zeros.
     This week's award from the AAAAA (American Association
Alleviating Acronym Abuse) goes to our friends: Caterina Sukup,
Larry Sakar, Sue Yan, M. B. Tully, Kerry Miller, Laura Hong Li,
Carol J. Becwar, Peter Adler, Heidel Lee, Jerry Taff, Beth
Butler, Etsuko Hori, Tadashi Umezawa, Dick Ginkowski, Mark 
Becwar and Howard Lesniak.  Many Thanks for all of your 
SUNFUN (Ha! Another One!) contributions.  I know this week 
I'll hear from some of you who still want to know why 
abbreviation is such a long word, but these short wordlets are 
everywhere.  You can't avoid them.  Why?  Because you are 
reading this via SMTP and/or TCP/IP on your PC MODEM, 
that's why!
     Have a Great Week!


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A3 - Advanced Army Acronyms
---------------------------
     In the intro to this edition of Funnies, I mentioned ho much
the military loves acronyms.  So how about some examples?  Here
are some real acronyms in current use by the U. S. Army:
 
  
     ACE    -  ASAS Collateral Enclave
            -  Armored Combat Earthmover
            -  Allied Command Europe
            -  Analysis and Control Element
            -  Aviation Combat Element
            -  Assistant Chief of Engineers
            -  Analysis and Control Element

          [ Makes me wonder... Does the Allied Command
          Europe end up with the Assistant Chief of
          Engineer's mail? ]

     ACTFAST - Advanced Concepts and Technology Frequency Agile
               Solid-State Tuner

     ABT     - Air Breathing Target
          [ Like us? ]
  
     ASSIST  - Army System for Standard Intelligence Support
               Terminals
  
     AUTOROS - Automated Retail Outlet System
          [ What the Army calls a bunch of vending
          machines. ]
  
     BOING   - Basis-of-Issue Narrative Guidance
          [ And a swell cartoon sound. ]
  
     COBRA   - Combat Outcome Based on Rules for Attrition
          [ We shoot, they shoot, last one to shoot
          wins. ]
  
     DISCO   - Defense Investigative Service Contract Office
  
     FRACAS  - Failure Reporting, Analysis, and Corrective Action
               System
  
     FROG    - Free Rocket Over Ground
  
     HA      - Hit Avoidance
          [ Of course - "HA! You missed us!" ]
  
     HERCULES - Heavy Equipment Recovery Combat Utility Lift and
               Evacuation System
  
     IMPACT  - Insensitive Munitions Packaging Technology
          [ Army talk for "It only goes bang when it's
          out of the box." ]
  
     KEG   -   Knowledge Engineering Group
          [ A bunch of engineers discussing plans over
          beer? ]
  
     KISS    - Korean Intelligence Support System
  
     OY      - Option Year
  
     PASTRAM - Passenger Traffic Management System
          [ On rye?  Oy!  Somebody in the Army Brass is
          Jewish. ]
  
     PIOTA   - (slang) Pull It Outa The Air (i.e. Make it up)
  
     POTS    - Plain Old Telephone Service
  
     RASPUTIN - Rapid Scenario Preparation Unit for Intelligence
  
     WAND    - Wide Area Neutralization Device
          [ Army talk for a really big bomb? ]
  
     WARS    - Worldwide Ammunition Reporting System
          [ And you thought that meant just a bunch of
          guys shooting, right? ]
  
  
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ACRONYM FACTOIDS
----------------
   - The antifungal, NYSTATIN, which is sometime used for
     treating thrush, is named after New York State Institute for
     Health.
  
  
   - QANTAS, the Australian national airline, originally meant
     "Queensland And Northern Territories Air Service."
  
  
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GEEK SPEAK DEPARTMENT
---------------------
  
     APPLE   - Arrogance Produces Profit-Losing Enterprise
  
     DOS     - Defective Operating System
  
     IBM     - I Blame Microsoft
  
     ISDN    - It Still Does Nothing 
  
     JAVA    - Just Another Vague Acronym
  
     MICROSOFT - Most Intelligent Customers Realize Our Software
               Only Fools Teenagers
  
     OS/2    - Obsolete Soon, Too.
  
     PCMCIA  - People Can't Memorize Computer Industry Acronyms
  
     PENTIUM - Produces Erroneous Numbers Thru Incorrect
               Understanding of Mathematics 
  
     SCSI    - System Can't See It 
  
     WINDOWS - Will Install Needless Data On Whole System 
  
  
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NAME GAMES...
----------
     The secret of longer life?  Just the usual advice, eat a
healthy diet, cut out smoking, exercise and make sure your
initials don't spell something negative.
     That's right.  Nicholas Christenfeld, Ph.D., associate
professor of psychology at the University of California at San
Diego, studied death certificates looking for positive and
negative words in people's initials.
     "We found 2,287 negative initials like D.I.E., R.A.T., B.U.M
and A.S.S., and 1,200 with positive initials like A.C.E., W.O.W.,
J.O.Y. and G.O.D.," he said.
     The study showed that men with positive initials like V.I.P.
or W.I.N. lived nearly five years longer than the control group
and women just over three years longer.  Negative initials seemed
to have no effect on women, but men with bad initials died 2.8
years sooner, on average.  (Reuters)
          [ Of course, this is just an initial study. ]
  
  
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AUTO-MATIC ACRONYMS DEPARTMENT
------------------------------
 
     AUDI    - Always Unsafe Designs Included
  
     BMW     - Big Money Waster
  
     BUICK   - Big Ugly Indestructible Compact Killer
  
     CADILLAC - Can't Always Drive In Lanes Like Another Car
  
     CHEVROLET - Cheap, Hardly Efficient, Valves Rap On Long
               Extended Trips
  
             - Cracked Heads, Every Valve's Rotten, Oil Leaks
               Every Time
  
     DODGE   - D*mn Old Dirty Gas Eater
  
     FIAT    - Failure in Italian Automotive Technology
  
             - Fix it again, Tony!
  
     FORD    - First On Recall Day
  
             - Found On Road, Dead
  
     GM      - Great Mistake
  
     GMC     - Got A Mechanic Coming?
  
     HONDA   - Had One, Never Did Again
  
     HYUNDAI - Hope You Understand Nothing's Driveable And
               Inexpensive...
  
     JEEP    - Just Eats Every Part
  
     MAZDA   - Most Always Zipping Dangerously Along
  
     MERCEDES - Men Express Really Crazy Egos Driving Expensive
               Sedans
  
     MG      - Money Guzzler
  
     OLDSMOBILE - Overpriced, Leisurely Driven Sedan Made Of
               Buick's Irregular Leftover Equipment
  
     PLYMOUTH - Please Let Your Mother Out Under The Hood
   
     PONTIAC - Poor Old Ninny Thinks It's A Cadillac
  
     PORSCHE - Piece Of Retired Scrap, Continually High Expense
  
     SAAB    - Swedish Automobiles Always Breakdown.
  
     SUBARU  - (backwards) U-R-A-Bus
  
     TOYOTA  - Too Often Yankees Overprice This Auto
  
     VOLVO   - Very Odd Looking Vehicular Object
  
     VW      - Virtually Worthless
  
  
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THE FRENCH HAVE A WORD FOR IT...
-----------------------------
     France's elite airborne rangers have just changed their name
to "reflect their new image in helping to defend the entire
European Union."  At least, that's what their spokesman claimed.
     The real reason?  Now that they are training with groups
that speak English, their old name "Commandos de Recherche et
d'Action en Profondeur" (Long-Range Search and Action Commandos)
had become too embarrassing.  You have to assume that the proud
French soldiers would get tired of having to explain that they
worked for CRAP.  The unit's new name is "Groupement de Commandos
Parachutistes" (Parachute Commando Group).  (AFP)
 
          [ You mean they rejected "Special
          Paratroopers Landing All Terrain? (SPLAT)" ]
  
  
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  COMING NEXT WEEK (01/10/99):
                             DUELING CULTURES
                When cultures meet, funny things happen...
  
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