Friday humour - December 23, 1998
From Davo at Bluehaze:
Thanks to Tony for providing a good read each week ... and for setting
up the 'humourites' list to which the majority of Mineralites are
subscribed.
Happy Christmas to the Sanderson family!
>From 'that' group way out West ...
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"Food for Thought"
Merry Christmas. If our mothers had told us this story instead of
the Santa story, we would all be disturbed young children ...
SANTA CLAUS: An Engineer's Perspective
I. There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18)
in the world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim,
Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist religions, this reduces the workload for
Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million (according to
the Population Reference Bureau). At an average (census) rate of 3.5
children per house hold, that comes to 108 million homes, presuming
that there is at least one good child in each.
II. Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to
the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he
travels east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 967.7
visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household
with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000th of a second to park
the sleigh, hop out, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings,
distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks
have been left for him, get back up the chimney, jump into the sleigh
and get on to the next house.
Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed
around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but will
accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking
about 0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.5 million miles,
not counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means Santa's sleigh is
moving at 650 miles per second --- 3,000 times the speed of sound.
For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle, the Ulysses
space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second, and a conventional
reindeer can run (at best) 15 miles per hour.
III. The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element.
Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized Lego
set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousand tons,
not counting Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull
no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that the "flying" reindeer
could pull ten times the normal amount, the job can't be done with
eight or even nine of them --- Santa would need 360,000 of them. This
increases the payload, not counting the weight of the sleigh,
another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of the Queen
Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch).
IV. 600,000 tons travelling at 650 miles per second creates
enormous air resistance --- this would heat up the reindeer in the
same fashion as a spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The
lead pair of reindeer would absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy
per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost
instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating
deafening sonic booms in their wake.
The entire reindeer team would be vaporised within 4.26 thousandths
of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house
on his trip. Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result
of accelerating from a dead stop to 650 m.p.s. in .001 seconds, would
be subjected to centrifugal forces of 17,500 g's. A 250 pound Santa
(which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of the
sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones
and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo.
V. Therefore, if Santa did exist, he's dead now!
So ... who eats the cake I leave out every Christmas Eve ???
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Every so often us HR-oriented Siro workers have to put up with the
sporting thoughts of one of the tricks who works in the pay office.
This is his Christmas delivery. Praise the Lord when Aussie footy
returns!
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Subject: Well hello
It's that time of the year to wish everyone well and to review the latest
sports results. Congratulations to all the Aussie cricket supporters. Those
Poms really are something aren't they? Still, we won yesterday, so things
are looking up until the next match. The rugby union was pretty close and we
did beat the South Africans, when nobody else could, so the 1999 World Cup
may not go to the much vaunted Southern Hemisphere. The biggest story is of
course Leeds Utd coming 4th in the Premier League, with Harry "the jewel"
Kewell is playing very well.
Have an enjoyable and safe festive season, and for you ladies, note this
quote which is applicable at home and work, from that lovely British band,
"Death in June" :-
" Show me the man who complains the most and I'll show you the man who does
the least ".
All's well that ends well, that's what I always say. Cup of tea?
<name withheld in case something goes wrong with your pay ...>
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>From Matt @ CUB ... btw Matt and Andrea are expecting a baby mid-
next year. If it's a girl they'e gonna call her Olive ... if it's
a boy it will be Bottle.
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Monica walks into her dry cleaning store and tells the guy, "I've got
another dress for you to clean."
Slightly hard of hearing, the clerk replies, "Come again?"
"No," says Monica. "Mustard."
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... and more from the West (Yo Martin, Ron, Neil, and Pauline ...
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A woman walks into an accountant's office and tells him that she
needs to file her taxes.
The accountant says, "Before we begin, I'll need to ask a few
questions."
He gets her name, address, tax file number, etc. and then asks,
"What is your occupation?"
The woman replies, "I'm a whore."
The accountant balks and says, "No, no, no. That will never work.
That is much too crass. Let's try to rephrase that."
The woman, "Ok, I'm a prostitute."
"No, that is still too crude. Try again." They both think for a
minute. Finally the woman states, "Okay, then... I'm a chicken
farmer."
"What?" the accountant asks. "What does chicken farming have to do
with being a whore or a prostitute?"
"Well," the woman explains, "I raised over 5,000 cocks last year."
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Just in case you feel the need to spend a lonely, dark Xmas break here at
work, then you will have to pay the price and submit a working alone form
to me, preferably before lunchtime on Thursday, 24/12.
OOOOooopps! Sorry about that ... this is no joke!
Remember to ring 8888 if anything untoward happens
at work over the Christmas break. (Pity nobody ever
taught AVS how to spell Christmas proper...)
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Politically Correct Christmas
'Twas the night before Christmas and Santa's a wreck...
How to live in a world that's politically correct?
His workers no longer would answer to "Elves".
"Vertically Challenged" they were calling themselves.
And labor conditions at the north pole
Were alleged by the union to stifle the soul.
Four reindeer had vanished, without much propriety,
Released to the wilds by the Humane Society.
And equal employment had made it quite clear
That Santa had better not use just reindeer.
So Dancer and Donner, Comet and Cupid,
Were replaced with 4 pigs, and you know that looked stupid!
The runners had been removed from his sleigh;
The ruts were termed dangerous by the E.P.A.
And people had started to call for the cops
When they heard sled noises on their roof-tops.
Second-hand smoke from his pipe had his workers quite frightened.
His fur trimmed red suit was called "Unenlightened."
And to show you the strangeness of life's ebbs and flows,
Rudolf was suing over unauthorized use of his nose
And had gone on Geraldo, in front of the nation,
Demanding millions in over-due compensation.
So, half of the reindeer were gone; and his wife,
Who suddenly said she'd enough of this life,
Joined a self-help group, packed, and left in a whiz,
Demanding from now on her title was Ms.
And as for the gifts, why, he'd ne'er had a notion
That making a choice could cause so much commotion.
Nothing of leather, nothing of fur,
Which meant nothing for him. And nothing for her.
Nothing that might be construed to pollute.
Nothing to aim. Nothing to shoot.
Nothing that clamored or made lots of noise.
Nothing for just girls. Or just for the boys.
Nothing that claimed to be gender specific.
Nothing that's warlike or like 'South Pacific'
No candy or sweets...they were bad for the tooth.
Nothing that seemed to embellish a truth.
And fairy tales, while not yet forbidden,
Were like Ken and Barbie, better off hidden.
For they raised the hackles of those psychological
Who claimed the only good gift was one ecological.
No baseball, no football...someone could get hurt;
Besides, playing sports exposed kids to dirt.
Dolls were said to be sexist, and should be pass;
And Nintendo would rot your entire brain away.
So Santa just stood there, disheveled, perplexed;
He just could not figure out what to do next.
He tried to be merry, tried to be gay,
But you've got to be careful with that word today!
His sack was quite empty, limp to the ground;
Nothing fully acceptable was to be found.
Something special was needed, a gift that he might
Give to all and sundry sans angering the left or the right.
A gift that would satisfy, with no indecision,
Each group of people, every religion;
Every ethnicity, every hue,
Everyone, everywhere ... even you.
So here is that gift, it's price beyond worth...
"May you and your loved ones enjoy peace on earth."
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One day in the Garden of Eden, Eve calls out to God, "Lord, I have a
problem!"
"What's the problem, Eve?"
"Lord, I know you've created me and have provided this beautiful garden
and all of these wonderful animals, and that hilarious comedy snake,
but I'm just not happy."
Why is that, Eve?", comes the reply from above.
"Lord, I am lonely. And I'm sick to death of apples."
"Well, Eve, in that case I have a solution. I shall create a man for
you."
"What's a 'man,' Lord?"
"This man will be a flawed creature, with aggressive tendencies, an
enormous ego and an inability to empathize or listen to you properly.
All in all he'll give you a hard time. But he'll be bigger and faster
and more muscular than you, he'll be really good at fighting and kicking
a ball about and hunting fleet-footed ruminants, and not altogether bad
in the sack."
"Sounds great," says Eve, with an ironically raised eyebrow.
"Yeah, well. He's better than a poke in the eye with a burnt stick.
But you can have him on one condition."
"What's that, Lord?"
"You'll have to let him believe that I made him first."
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Subject: A Chirstmas Cake recipe
A FRUIT CAKE
INGREDIENTS
1 cup butter
2 large eggs
Nuts
1 cup brown sugar
1 bottle whisky
1 cup sugar
1 cup dried fruit
1 teas salt
lemon juice
1 teaspoon baking powder
Method
Sample the whisky to check for quality. Take a large bowl. Check the
whicky again to be sure it is of the highest quality, and pour one level
teaspoon and drink. Repeat
Turn on the electric mixer, beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy
bowl. Add one spoontea of sugar and beat again. Make sure the whisky
is still O.K. Cry another tup. Turn off the mixer. Break two leggs
and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit. Mix on the
turner. If the fruit gets stuck in the beaters, pry it loose with a
screwdriver. Sample the whicky again to check for tonisticity.
Next, sift two cups of salt or something. Who cares? Check the
whisky. Now sift the lemon juice and strain your nuts. Add one
babblespoon of brown sugar and whatever colour you can find. Wix mel.
Grease the oven. Turn the cake pan to 350 gredees. Don't forget to beat
off the turner. Throw the bowl out the window, check the whisky and go
to bed.
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Have a bonza Christmas ... and if you can't be naughty
... be nice!
s e a s o n s g r e e t i n g s
- Davo
[ End Fri humour ]
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