| Friday, May 02, 2008 |
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Gambling with the IRS
By Diana Hsieh @ 12:11 AM   
I got this joke in my e-mail a few days after tax day:
The IRS decides to audit Ralph, and summons him to the IRS office. The IRS auditor is not surprised when Ralph shows up with his attorney.
The auditor says, "Well, sir, you have an extravagant lifestyle and no full-time employment, which you explain by saying that you win money gambling. I'm not sure the IRS finds that believable."
"I'm a great gambler, and I can prove it," says Ralph. "How about a demonstration?" The auditor thinks for a moment and said, "Okay. Go ahead."
Ralph says, "I'll bet you a thousand dollars that I can bite my own eye."
The auditor thinks a moment and says, "It's a bet."
Ralph removes his glass eye and bites it. The auditor's jaw drops.
Ralph says, "Now, I'll bet you two thousand dollars that I can bite my other eye." Now the auditor can tell Ralph isn't blind, so he takes the bet.
Ralph removes his dentures and bites his good eye. The stunned auditor now realizes he has wagered and lost three grand, with Ralph's attorney as a witnes s. He starts to get nervous.
"Want to go double or nothing?" Ralph asks "I'll bet you six thousand dollars that I can stand on one side of your desk, and pee into that wastebasket on the other side, and never get a drop anywhere in between."
The auditor, twice burned, is cautious now, but he looks carefully and decides there's no way this guy could possibly manage that stunt, so he agrees again.
Ralph stands beside the desk and unzips his pants, but although he strains mightily, he can't make the stream reach the wastebasket on the other side, so he pretty much urinates all over the auditor's desk.
The auditor leaps with joy, realizing that he has just turned a major loss into a huge win. But Ralph's attorney moans and puts his head in his hands. "Are you okay?" the auditor asks.
"Not really," says the attorney. "This morning, when Ralph told me he'd been summoned for an audit, he bet me twenty-five thousand dollars that he could come in here and piss all over your desk and that you'd be happy about it." Heh.Labels: Funny
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| Monday, December 31, 2007 |
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New Year Resolutions for Your Cat
By Diana Hsieh @ 8:34 AM
I strongly recommend reading these New Year resolutions to your cat. It won't do any good, but you'll find their behavior even more funny next year.
My human will never let me eat their pet hamster, and I am at peace with that.
I will not slurp fish food from the surface of the aquarium.
I will not eat large numbers of assorted bugs, then come home and throw them up so the humans can see that I'm getting plenty of roughage.
I will not lean way over to drink out of the tub, fall in, and then pelt right for the box of clumping cat litter. (It took FOREVER to get the stuff out of my fur.)
I will not use the bathtub to store live mice for late-night snacks.
We will not play "Herd of Thundering Wildebeests Stampeding Across the Plains of the Serengeti" over any humans' bed while they're trying to sleep.
I cannot leap through closed windows to catch birds outside. If I forget this and bonk my head on the window and fall behind the couch in my attempt, I will not get up and do the same thing again.
I will not assume the patio door is open when I race outside to chase leaves.
I will not stick my paw into any container to see if there is something in it. If I do, I will not hiss and scratch when my human has to shave me to get the rubber cement out of my fur.
If I bite the cactus, it will bite back.
When it rains, it will be raining on all sides of the house. It is not necessary to check every door.
I will not play "dead cat on the stairs" while people are trying to bring in groceries or laundry, or else one of these days, it will really come true.
When the humans play darts, I will not leap into the air and attempt to catch them.
I will not swat my human's head repeatedly when they are on the family room floor trying to do sit ups.
When my human is typing at the computer, their forearms are not a hammock.
Computer and TV screens do not exist to backlight my lovely tail.
I will not puff my entire body to twice its size for no reason after my human has watched a horror movie.
I will not stand on the bathroom counter, stare down the hall, and growl at NOTHING after my human has watched the X-Files.
I will not drag dirty socks onto the bed at night and then yell at the top of my lungs so that my humans can admire my "kill."
I will not perch on my human's chest in the middle of the night and stare until they wake up.
I will not walk on the key board when my human is writing important adagfsg gdjag ;ln.
If I must claw my human I will not do it in such a way that the scars resemble a botched suicide attempt.
If I must give a present to my human guests, my toy mouse is much more socially acceptable than a big live bug, even if it isn't as tasty. Any more, fellow cat servants?Labels: Funny
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| Saturday, December 29, 2007 |
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Top 30 Failed Technology Predictions
By Paul Hsieh @ 12:52 AM
Here is an interesting list of failed predictions about future technology:1. "There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." -- Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), maker of big business mainframe computers, arguing against the PC in 1977.
2. "We will never make a 32 bit operating system." -- Bill Gates
3. "Lee DeForest has said in many newspapers and over his signature that it would be possible to transmit the human voice across the Atlantic before many years. Based on these absurd and deliberately misleading statements, the misguided public ... has been persuaded to purchase stock in his company ..." -- a U.S. District Attorney, prosecuting American inventor Lee DeForest for selling stock fraudulently through the mail for his Radio Telephone Company in 1913.
4. "There is practically no chance communications space satellites will be used to provide better telephone, telegraph, television, or radio service inside the United States." -- T. Craven, FCC Commissioner, in 1961 (the first commercial communications satellite went into service in 1965).
5. "To place a man in a multi-stage rocket and project him into the controlling gravitational field of the moon where the passengers can make scientific observations, perhaps land alive, and then return to earth - all that constitutes a wild dream worthy of Jules Verne. I am bold enough to say that such a man-made voyage will never occur regardless of all future advances." -- Lee DeForest, American radio pioneer and inventor of the vacuum tube, in 1926
6. "A rocket will never be able to leave the Earth's atmosphere." -- New York Times, 1936.
7. "Flight by machines heavier than air is unpractical (sic) and insignificant, if not utterly impossible." - Simon Newcomb; The Wright Brothers flew at Kittyhawk 18 months later.
8. "Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." -- Lord Kelvin, British mathematician and physicist, president of the British Royal Society, 1895.
9. "There will never be a bigger plane built." -- A Boeing engineer, after the first flight of the 247, a twin engine plane that holds ten people
10. "Nuclear-powered vacuum cleaners will probably be a reality in 10 years." -- Alex Lewyt, president of vacuum cleaner company Lewyt Corp., in the New York Times in 1955.
11. "This is the biggest fool thing we have ever done. The bomb will never go off, and I speak as an expert in explosives." -- Admiral William D. Leahy, Chief of Staff to the Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy during World War II, advising President Truman on the atomic bomb, 1945.[6] Leahy admitted the error five years later in his memoirs
12. "The energy produced by the breaking down of the atom is a very poor kind of thing. Anyone who expects a source of power from the transformation of these atoms is talking moonshine." -- Ernest Rutherford, shortly after splitting the atom for the first time.
13. "There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable. It would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will." -- Albert Einstein, 1932
14. "The cinema is little more than a fad. It's canned drama. What audiences really want to see is flesh and blood on the stage." -- Charlie Chaplin, actor, producer, director, and studio founder, 1916
15. "The horse is here to stay but the automobile is only a novelty - a fad." -- The president of the Michigan Savings Bank advising Henry Ford's lawyer, Horace Rackham, not to invest in the Ford Motor Co., 1903
16. "The Americans have need of the telephone, but we do not. We have plenty of messenger boys." -- Sir William Preece, Chief Engineer, British Post Office, 1878.
17. "This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." -- A memo at Western Union, 1878 (or 1876).
18. "The world potential market for copying machines is 5000 at most." -- IBM, to the eventual founders of Xerox, saying the photocopier had no market large enough to justify production, 1959.
19. "I must confess that my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocating its crew and floundering at sea." -- HG Wells, British novelist, in 1901.
20. "X-rays will prove to be a hoax." -- Lord Kelvin, President of the Royal Society, 1883.
21. "The idea that cavalry will be replaced by these iron coaches is absurd. It is little short of treasonous." -- Comment of Aide-de-camp to Field Marshal Haig, at tank demonstration, 1916.
22. "How, sir, would you make a ship sail against the wind and currents by lighting a bonfire under her deck? I pray you, excuse me, I have not the time to listen to such nonsense." -- Napoleon Bonaparte, when told of Robert Fulton's steamboat, 1800s.
23. "Fooling around with alternating current is just a waste of time. Nobody will use it, ever." -- Thomas Edison, American inventor, 1889 (Edison often ridiculed the arguments of competitor George Westinghouse for AC power).
24. "Home Taping Is Killing Music" -- A 1980s campaign by the BPI, claiming that people recording music off the radio onto cassette would destroy the music industry.
25. "Television won't last. It's a flash in the pan." -- Mary Somerville, pioneer of radio educational broadcasts, 1948.
26. "[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 Zanuck, movie producer, 20th Century Fox, 1946.
27. "When the Paris Exhibition [of 1878] closes, electric light will close with it and no more will be heard of it." - Oxford professor Erasmus Wilson
28. "Dear Mr. President: The canal system of this country is being threatened by a new form of transportation known as 'railroads' ... As you may well know, Mr. President, 'railroad' carriages are pulled at the enormous speed of 15 miles per hour by 'engines' which, in addition to endangering life and limb of passengers, roar and snort their way through the countryside, setting fire to crops, scaring the livestock and frightening women and children. The Almighty certainly never intended that people should travel at such breakneck speed." -- Martin Van Buren, Governor of New York, 1830(?).
29. "Rail travel at high speed is not possible because passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia." -- Dr Dionysys Larder (1793-1859), professor of Natural Philosophy and Astronomy, University College London.
30. "The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to no one in particular?" -- Associates of David Sarnoff responding to the latter's call for investment in the radio in 1921. (Via Fark.)Labels: Funny, Technology
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| Sunday, December 02, 2007 |
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Productivity
By Diana Hsieh @ 12:01 AM
I love The Onion: Study Finds Working At Work Improves Productivity.
According to a groundbreaking new study by the Department of Labor, working--the physical act of engaging in a productive job-related activity--may greatly increase the amount of work accomplished during the workday, especially when compared with the more common practices of wasting time and not working.
"Our findings are astounding: By simply sitting down and doing work, employees can dramatically increase their output of goods and services," said Deputy Undersecretary of Labor Charlotte Ponticelli, who authored the report. "In fact, 'working' may revolutionize the way people work."
Perhaps even more shocking, the study reveals that not working significantly decreases worker productivity, sometimes even resulting in no work getting done at all. Similar findings were reported in the areas of avoiding work, putting off work, complaining about work instead of actually working, pretending to work, and fucking around. I've personally confirmed those results in my own life, as I'm sure others have as well.Labels: Funny
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| Thursday, November 22, 2007 |
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Turkey Urban Legend
By Paul Hsieh @ 12:50 AM
In honor of Thanksgiving, here is a classic urban legend about turkey preparation. (The original version takes place at Christmas, but it is equally well suited for Thanksgiving):Last year, my mom went to my sister's house for the traditional holiday feast. Knowing how gullible my sister is, my mom decided to play a trick.
She told my sister that she needed something from the store and asked if my sister wouldn't mind going out to get it.
When my sister left the house, my mom took the turkey out of the oven, removed the stuffing, stuffed a Cornish hen, and inserted it into the turkey, then re-stuffed the turkey.
She then placed the bird(s) back into the oven.
When it was time for dinner, my sister pulled the turkey out of the oven and proceeded to remove the stuffing. When her serving spoon hit something, she reached in and pulled out the little bird.
With a look of total shock on her face, my mother exclaimed, "Barbara, you've cooked a pregnant bird!"
At the reality of this horrifying news, my sister started to cry hysterically. It took the entire family almost two hours to convince her that turkeys lay eggs! Labels: Funny
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| Saturday, November 03, 2007 |
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Kids on Marriage
By Diana Hsieh @ 7:23 AM
Funny, whether invented or not:
What exactly is marriage?
"Marriage is when you get to keep your girl and don't have to give her back to her parents." -- Eric, age 6
"When somebody's been dating for a while, the boy might propose to the girl. He says to her, 'I'll take you for a whole life, or at least until we have kids and get divorced, but you got to do one particular thing for me.' Then she says yes, but she's wondering what the thing is and whether it's naughty or not. She can't wait to find out." -- Anita, age 9
How did your mom and dad meet?
"They were at a dance party at a friend's house. Then they went for a drive, but their car broke down. It was a good thing, because it gave them a chance to find out about their values." -- Lottie, age 9
"My father was doing some strange chores for my mother. They won't tell me what kind." -- Jeremy, age 8
Is it better to be single or married?
"I don't know which is better, but I'll tell you one thing. I'm never going to have sex with my wife. I don't want to be all grossed out." -- Theodore, age 8
"You should ask the people who read Cosmopolitan." -- Kirsten, age 10
"It's better for girls to be single but not for boys. Boys need somebody to clean up after them." -- Anita, age 9
"It gives me a headache to think | |
