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 [ BACK]  [NEXT]                       Issue #326 - 11/10/2002

DUCK! IT'S A REDUX!

SUNFUN Rerun, Anyone?

Hello Again Funnies Fans,
     There is something sort of unfair about reruns.  Isn't it
kind of insulting that the folks putting on the program rely on
your bad memory to entertain you again with stuff you have
already seen once?
     Even worse, it works.
     We do watch it again, having forgotten the details of plot,
story and character.  After a time, inconsequential events that
are not life changing or life threatening all become a blur of
past experience.  We will watch or do the same things from a kind
of instinct, not realizing we had done it before.  All of us have
this experience of putting the deja in vu, even those not doing
serious self-medicating.  This not only explains how the same
goofs keep getting re-elected to office, but also how some jokes
have survived retellings basically unchanged since the ancient
Greeks.
     This is a boon to all humorists, because, at the core of it,
there are really only three jokes.  All the rest are simply
variations on a theme.  I'm not going to spend much time here
discussing these three jokes, because: 1) I'm being lazy this
week, and, 2) who needs the competition?
     Thanks this week to all of you who help out with this bit of
weekly silliness - both then and now.  Special Thanks this week
to:  Naomi Ogawa, Kyle Peterson, Jerry Taff, Rosana & Stanley
Leung, Yasmin Leischer, Carol J. Becwar, Bruce Gonzo, Michael S.
Fagan & Tomoko Naito, The Peterson's, Bernie & Donna Becwar, R.J.
Tully, Jan Michalski, Tim McChain, Susan Will and Charles
Beckman.  As for repeating material...  Try not to think of this
as a rerun; it will help lots if you think of it as humor
recycling.  And no, I'm not going to tell you which of these
stories goes back to ancient Greece.
     Have A Great Week - Again!

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From: ARMED AND CONSIDERED RIDICULOUS!  01/17/1999

REACH OUT AND TOUCH SOMEONE...
---------------------------
     For some unknown reason, Michael Robinson called in a bomb
threat to police in England.  While delivering the threat, he
became concerned about the length of time the call was taking,
and how expensive his phone bill would be.  So he told police to
"Call me back," and gave them his phone number.


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From: WRITE OFFS  02/07/1999

HOW TO WRITE GOOD
-----------------
     You too can become a successful writer by following these
simple little rules:

  -  Do not put statements in the negative form.

  -  A writer must not shift your point of view.

  -  Verbs has to agree with their subjects.

  -  Avoid annoying alliteration.

  -  Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.

  -  Cliches are old hat.  Avoid them like the plague.

  -  Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are unnecessary.

  -  Don't use no double negatives.

  -  Contractions aren't necessary.

  -  Correct speling is esential.

  -  Comparisons are as bad as cliches.

  -  Don't overuse exclamation marks!!!!

  -  Be more or less specific.

  -  Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.

  -  One-word sentences? Eliminate.

  -  Use apostrophe's correctly.

  -  And don't start a sentence with a conjunction.

  -  The passive voice is to be avoided.

  -  Remember to never split an infinitive.

  -  Who needs rhetorical questions?

  -  Proofread carefully to see if you any words out.


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From: THE OLD PHILOSOPHER  02/21/1999

THE FIRST LAW OF PHILOSOPHY
---------------------------
     For every philosopher, there exists an equal and opposite
     philosopher.


THE SECOND LAW OF PHILOSOPHY
----------------------------
     They're both wrong.


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From: BYTE ME!  06/06/1999

TEN ANAGRAMS FOR "INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY"
------------------------------------------
     Re-arrange the letters in "Information Superhighway" and
get:

     1.  Enormous, hairy pig with fan.

     2.  Hey, ignoramus - win profit?  Ha!

     3.  Oh-oh, wiring snafu: empty air.

     4.  When forming, utopia's hairy.

     5.  A rough wimper of insanity.

     6.  Oh, wormy infuriating phase.

     7.  Inspire humanity, who go far.

     8.  Waiting for any promise, huh?

     9.  Hi-ho!  Yow!  I'm surfing Arpanet!

     10. New utopia?  Horrifying sham.

                            - SOURCE: Enormous hairy pig with fan


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From: DAYS OF FUTURES PAST  06/27/1999

THE UNSTEADY MARCH OF PROGRESS
------------------------------
          The Experts Predict the Future...


   - "When the Paris Exhibition closes electric light will close
     with it and no more be heard of."
                       - Erasmus Wilson (1878) Professor at
                         Oxford University


   - "Well informed people know it is impossible to transmit the
     voice over wires and that were it possible to do so, the
     thing would be of no practical value."
                       - 1865 editorial in the Boston Post


   - The Kolonische Zeitung [Koln, Germany, 28 March 1819] listed
     the following reasons against using gas for street lighting,
     including:

          Theological:   It is an intervention in God's order,
               which makes nights dark...

          Medical:   It will be easier for people to be in the
               streets at night, afflicting them with colds...

          Philosophical-moral:   Morality deteriorates through
               street lighting.  Artificial lighting drives out
               fear of the dark, which keeps the weak from
               sinning...


   - "[Television] won't be able to hold on to any market it
     captures after the first six months.  People will soon get
     tired of staring at a plywood box every night."
                       - Darryl F. Zanuck, head of 20th
                         Century-Fox in 1946.


   - "What can be more palpably absurd than the prospect held out
     of locomotives traveling twice as fast as stagecoaches?"
                       - The Quarterly Review, England (March
                         1825)


   - "Rail travel at high speed is not possible because
     passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia."
                            - Dr. Dionysus Lardner (1793-1859),
                              Professor of Natural Philosophy and
                              Astronomy at University College,
                              London, lecturing on the dangers of
                              high-speed rail transport - at 20
                              MPH (32 KM/H).


   - "Men might as well project a voyage to the Moon as attempt
     to employ steam navigation against the stormy North Atlantic
     Ocean."
                       - Dr. Dionysus Lardner (1838) Professor of
                         Natural Philosophy and Astronomy,
                         University College, London


   - "That the automobile has practically reached the limit of
     its development is suggested by the fact that during the
     past year no improvements of a radical nature have been
     introduced."
                       - Scientific American, Jan. 2, 1909.


 - And a true expert who knew better...

   - "I confess that in 1901 I said to my brother Orville that
     man would not fly for fifty years.  Two years later we
     ourselves made flights.  This demonstration of my impotence
     as a prophet gave me such a shock that ever since I have
     distrusted myself and avoided all predictions."
                       - Wilbur Wright, 1908


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From: PATENTLY WEIRD!  08/22/1999

MORE-OR-LESS USELESS INVENTIONS...
-------------------------------
     Straight from the Patent Office, here are some actual
inventions that appear to have come from the far side of reality. 
Were any ever made?  I don't know.  But none of these sounds very
promising.


 - U.S. Patent 490,964 - Combined Clothes-Brush, Flask and
     Drinking Cup.  (1893)
          Just the thing if you need a little hair of the dog
          while brushing off in the morning.


   - U.S. Patent 515,001 - Fishing Apparatus  (1894)
          About the screwiest kind of contraption ever patented. 
          This is a fish hook with an attached vanity mirror on a
          little arm.  Why?  
          "In this position ... the fish B, when approaching the
          baits, will see the reflection B', of himself in the
          mirror, also coming for that reflection of the baits',
          and will be made bolder by the supposed companionship,
          and more eager to take the bait before his competitor
          seizes it.  He will lose his caution, and take the bait
          with a recklessness that greatly increases the chances
          of his being caught on the hook."  
          The device was never marketed.  Apparently fish were
          either less greedy or less vain than the inventor
          thought.


   - U.S. Patent 5,224,646 - Dripless Ice Cream Holder (1993)
          This is just a larger cone that goes over your ice
          cream cone to catch drips.  It also prevents you from
          eating any of the cone part and leaves you with a cup
          of melted goo.  Such is the price of progress


   - U.S. Patent 556,246 - Saluting Device  (1896)
          This slightly daft idea was a mechanism that attached
          to a gentleman's head so his hat would tip in a polite
          salute without using his hands.  If this sounds stupid,
          you should see the patent drawing.


   - U.S. Patent 5,664,474 - Bread Slicing Guide (1995)
          For those of you who have to have things just perfect,
          this round tray allows you to slice bread with absolute
          uniformity.  Apparently, this is a more active field of
          innovation than we'd suspect, as the patent lists 23
          prior patents on similar inventions as references, so
          SOMEBODY must be worried about this.


   - U.S. Patent 748,284 - Method of Preserving the Dead  (1903)
          The inventor thinks that placing the heads of our
          departed loved ones in large blocks of glass would be a
          good idea.  These nightmarish knickknacks never quite
          caught on.
          [ HA! And you though Uncle Ernie was a
          blockhead when he was alive! ]


   - U.S. Patent 5,197,216 - Combined Camouflage and Decoy Device 
     (1993)
          "A guy walks into a bar with a duck on his head... "
          This innovation conveniently combines the hunter's hat
          and bird decoy into one - leaving our hunter walking
          around with a stuffed fowl on his head.  Now all the
          hunter has to worry about is other hunters blasting
          away at the life-like object when they see it moving
          through the woods.


   - U.S. Patent 5,713,081 - An Improved Design of Panty Hose. 
     (1997)
          You ladies have all had the experience of a panty hose
          blowout just when you're leaving for that important
          appointment.  Don't dig out the nail polish - with
          these multiple wear pantyhose you have a built in
          spare; they feature six legs from each "center
          section."  The idea was to use only two of the legs at
          a time, unless you were a space alien or bad clone. 
          The extra legs?  According to the inventor, you just
          tuck them in up at the waistline.  Guaranteed to give
          even the sleekest model the lumpy appearance of an
          over-the-hill football linebacker.


   - U.S. Patent 35,600 - Combined Plow and Gun  (1862)
          The Bible talks about "beating their swords into
          plowshares," right?  So, why not go the other way? 
          This device was invented during the American Civil War,
          and is aimed to make even the lowliest farmer into a
          true "citizen soldier."  The top of this plow is shaped
          into a small, cast-iron cannon, allowing the farm
          implement to be used at a moments' notice as a light
          artillery piece.


   - U.S. Patent 3,216,423 - Improved Delivery Table  (1965)
          There are two ways of looking at this idea: either the
          inventors were trying to shoot a newborn baby across
          the room on delivery or just to make the expectant mom
          puke.  Mom was supposed to be strapped onto this
          rotating bed - which sounds for all the world like a
          really bad carnival ride - and the centrifugal force
          would encourage baby to emerge.  Half the fun would be
          watching the nurses and doctors run around in a circle
          trying to keep up.


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From: THE WEED OF CRIME GROWS STUPID FRUIT...  08/29/1999

HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT...
---------------------
     Nearly everything we do has to be done in a certain order to
be successful - you have to bake a cake before you frost it,
right?  It seems that successful a crime follows the same rules
of order.
     Take the case of the 44-year-old bank robber in Aldergrove,
British Columbia (Canada), who stood patiently in line with the
other customers.  While he waited, he made preparations for the
upcoming robbery by putting a nylon stocking on his head wearing
it like a hat.  He did this in full view of the other people
waiting in line.
     When his turn at the teller window came, the bandit pulled
the stocking down over his face, pulled a knife and demanded
cash.
     Several bank customers, who had witnessed the man's peculiar
choice of fashion, decided that anyone THAT stupid couldn't be
much of a threat.  They tackled him as he tried to leave the
scene and held him for police - who arrived very quickly since
the bank is nearly next door to a police station.  (Reuters)


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© 2002 by Bill Becwar. All Rights Reserved.