Freebsd Fortunes 2

        "I believe you have the wrong number," said the old gentleman into
the phone.  "You'll have to call the weather bureau for that information."
        "Who was that?" his young wife asked.
        "Some guy wanting to know if the coast was clear."

        "I cannot read the fiery letters," said Frito Bugger in a
quavering voice.
        "No," said GoodGulf, "but I can.  The letters are Elvish, of
course, of an ancient mode, but the language is that of Mordor, which
I will not utter here.  They are lines of a verse long known in
Elven-lore:

        "This Ring, no other, is made by the elves,
        Who'd pawn their own mother to grab it themselves.
        Ruler of creeper, mortal, and scallop,
        This is a sleeper that packs quite a wallop.
        The Power almighty rests in this Lone Ring.
        The Power, alrighty, for doing your Own Thing.
        If broken or busted, it cannot be remade.
        If found, send to Sorhed (with postage prepaid)."
                -- Harvard Lampoon, "Bored of the Rings"

        I did some heavy research so as to be prepared for "Mommy, why is
the sky blue?"
        HE asked me about black holes in space.
        (There's a hole *where*?)

        I boned up to be ready for, "Why is the grass green?"
        HE wanted to discuss nature's food chains.
        (Well, let's see, there's ShopRite, Pathmark...)

        I talked about Choo-Choo trains.
        HE talked internal combustion engines.
        (The INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINE said, "I think I can, I think I can.")

        I was delighted with the video game craze, thinking we could compete
as equals.
        HE described the complexities of the microchips required to create
the graphics.

        Then puberty struck.  Ah, adolescence.
        HE said, "Mom, I just don't understand women."
        (Gotcha!)
                -- Betty LiBrizzi, "The Care and Feeding of a Gifted Child"

        I disapprove of the F-word, not because it's dirty, but because we
use it as a substitute for thoughtful insults, and it frequently leads to
violence.  What we ought to do, when we anger each other, say, in traffic,
is exchange phone numbers, so that later on, when we've had time to think
of witty and learned insults or look them up in the library, we could call
each other up:
     You: Hello?  Bob?
     Bob: Yes?
     You: This is Ed.  Remember?  The person whose parking space you
          took last Thursday?  Outside of Sears?
     Bob: Oh yes!  Sure!  How are you, Ed?
     You: Fine, thanks.  Listen, Bob, the reason I'm calling is:
          "Madam, you may be drunk, but I am ugly, and ..."  No, wait.
          I mean:  "you may be ugly, but I am Winston Churchill
          and ..."  No, wait.  (Sound of reference book thudding onto
          the floor.)  S-word.  Excuse me.  Look, Bob, I'm going to
          have to get back to you.
     Bob: Fine.
                -- Dave Barry

        "I don't know what you mean by 'glory'," Alice said.
        Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously.  "Of course you don't --
till I tell you.  I meant 'there's a nice knock-down argument for you!'"
        "But glory doesn't mean 'a nice knock-down argument'," Alice
objected.
        "When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful
tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less."
        "The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean
so many different things."
        "The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master --
that's all."

        I for one cannot protest the recent M.T.A. fare hike and the
accompanying promises that this would in no way improve service.  For
the transit system, as it now operates, has hidden advantages that
can't be measured in monetary terms.
        Personally, I feel that it is well worth 75 cents or even $1 to
have that unimpeachable excuse whenever I am late to anything:  "I came
by subway."  Those four words have such magic in them that if Godot
should someday show up and mumble them, any audience would instantly
understand his long delay.

        "I have examined Bogota," he said, "and the case is clearer to me.
I think very probably he might be cured."
        "That is what I have always hoped," said old Yacob.
        "His brain is affected," said the blind doctor.
        The elders murmured assent.
        "Now, what affects it?"
        "Ah!" said old Yacob.
        "This," said the doctor, answering his own question.  "Those queer
things that are called the eyes, and which exist to make an agreeable soft
depression in the face, are diseased, in the case of Bogota, in such a way
as to affect his brain.  They are greatly distended, he has eyelashes, and
his eyelids move, and consequently his brain is in a state of constant
irritation and distraction."
        "Yes?" said old Yacob.  "Yes?"
        "And I think I may say with reasonable certainty that, in order
to cure him completely, all that we need do is a simple and easy surgical
operation - namely, to remove those irritant bodies."
        "And then he will be sane?"
        "Then he will be perfectly sane, and a quite admirable citizen."
        "Thank heaven for science!" said old Yacob.
                -- H.G. Wells, "The Country of the Blind"

        I made it a rule to forbear all direct contradictions to the sentiments
of others, and all positive assertion of my own.  I even forbade myself the use
of every word or expression in the language that imported a fixed opinion, such
as "certainly", "undoubtedly", etc.   I adopted instead of them "I conceive",
"I apprehend", or "I imagine" a thing to be so or so; or "so it appears to me
at present".
        When another asserted something that I thought an error, I denied
myself the pleasure of contradicting him abruptly, and of showing him
immediately some absurdity in his proposition.  In answering I began by
observing that in certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right,
but in the present case there appeared or seemed to me some difference, etc.
        I soon found the advantage of this change in my manner; the
conversations I engaged in went on more pleasantly.  The modest way in which I
proposed my opinions procured them a readier reception and less contradiction.
I had less mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily
prevailed with others to give up their mistakes and join with me when I
happened to be in the right.
                -- Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

        I managed to say, "Sorry," and no more.  I knew that he disliked
me to cry.
        This time he said, watching me, "On some occasions it is better
to weep."
        I put my head down on the table and sobbed, "If only she could come
back; I would be nice."
        Francis said, "You gave her great pleasure always."
        "Oh, not enough."
        "Nobody can give anybody enough."
        "Not ever?"
        "No, not ever.  But one must go on trying."
        "And doesn't one ever value people until they are gone?"
        "Rarely," said Francis.  I went on weeping; I saw how little I had
valued him; how little I had valued anything that was mine.
                -- Pamela Frankau, "The Duchess and the Smugs"

        I paid a visit to my local precinct in Greenwich Village and
asked a sergeant to show me some rape statistics.  He politely obliged.
That month there had been thirty-five rape complaints, an advance of ten
over the same month for the previous year.  The precinct had made two
arrests.
        "Not a very impressive record," I offered.
        "Don't worry about it," the sergeant assured me.  "You know what
these complaints represent?"
        "What do they represent?" I asked.
        "Prostitutes who didn't get their money," he said firmly,
closing the book.
                -- Susan Brownmiller, "Against Our Will"