Issue
number: 14
Posted
on: February 11th, 1999
This
site can also be accessed through the more wieldy url:
http://choppingedge.com/quorum
The
next issue will appear, like clockwork, some time pretty soon.
File
under: Wet Humor
SPECIAL
DOUBLE ISSUE:
SPORTS
AND HISTORY
Atlanta out-gunned Toronto on Thursday with an all-out head-on blow-up as
left-hander Wright Ander shut down sixteen of Toronto's star blasters with his
much-dreaded side-winding back-sliding upper-plater for seven and three after
only four go-arounds while Toronto's Blake hung fourteen top-spinners across
the firing line for six one-baggers, five two-seaters, four triple-deckers and
seven long-haul round-tripper quadruple by-passes, putting the tally sheet at
eight and six for three after five front-loaders and four side-steppers, to
bring Atlanta's ranking in the league's roster to six and oh and seven and
seventeen and seventeen and seventeen and oh and oh and uh-oh what the hell
sport am I talking about anyway?
Yesterday's Games
at a Glance
a roundup of the
results of yesterday's pro action:
San Francisco Beats
Phoenix
Denver Whips Kansas
City
St Louis Trounces
Chicago
Baltimore Urges
Boston to "Pick Two",
Delivers Painful
Blow to Eyes
Houston Kicks
Sand in New York's Face,
Runs Off With Girl
Philadelphia
Lures Washington off Edge of Cliff,
Washington Falls
Only After Realizing That It is Over Gaping Void,
Appears
Miraculously Unhurt Just Seconds Later
Milwaukee
Massacres Miami
Detroit Maims
Los Angeles
Cleveland Disjoints
Dallas
Minneapolis
Strangles New Orleans in Fit of Passion,
Cuts Corpse into
Small Pieces with Electric Carving Knife,
Leaves Head in Gym
Bag in Bus Station Locker
Body of Oakland
Found Lying Dead in Pool of Blood,
Pittsburgh
Convicted of Manslaughter in Montreal Case,
Execution by Lethal
Injection Set for July 22nd
... and now on to Cricket:
The New Zealand All-Johns met the Tasmania
No-Bobs on Thursday for their annual exhibition test match in
Christchurch. The starting lineup for the All-Johns was:
Jan Johnson
Yann Johnston
Ian Jackson
Ivan Johanson
Johannes Jansen
Juan Iverson
Jacky "J.J." St John
John "John-John" John
and for
the No-Bobs:
Herbert Filbert
Hubert Humbert
Gilbert Schubert
Albert Lambert
Delbert Cuthbert
Norbert Westbert
Fredbert Ethelbert
Limebert Sherbet
The teams took the field. The national
anthems were played. Hands were shaken all around. A coin was
flipped. The athletes took their positions for the start of play.
The crowd roared. The excitement mounted. The tension became
unbearable. Children cried. Fourteen women and twelve men fainted and had
to be hospitalized. A speeding car careened around a corner in a crowded
market, upsetting a fruit cart. After what seemed an eternity, the
whistle blew. A stout, hulking, ferocious brute seized the bat with the
lust for victory burning in his eyes. Only then was it remembered that
you need eleven on a side to play cricket and there were only eight on each
team. The game was canceled. A siren blew faintly in the
distance. Somewhere, a dog barked.
The International Olympic Committee
announced on Thursday that a new event called the Centathlon will be included
in the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia. After the Biathlon
(skiing, shooting), the Triathlon (cycling, swimming, running), the Pentathlon
(discus tossing, shotput chucking, javelin heaving, hammer hurling, lunch
launching) the Septathlon (name licensing, product endorsing, money
earning, drug buying, arrest resisting, plea bargaining, time doing) and the
Decathlon (jogging, running, dashing, sprinting, sweating, panting, faltering,
falling, fainting, dying), the Centathlon is considered by many to be the
"ultimate sport". While Decathlon contestants are known as
"iron men", Centathlon contestants are known as "iron men with a
lot of spare time, if you ask us International Olympic Committee members".
Contestants compete in a rapid and
uninterrupted succession of competitions of escalating difficulty. The
events, or "thlons" as they are called, start with thumb wrestling,
arm wrestling, leg wrestling, a walking race, a sack race, running, hurdling,
high jumping, pole vaulting, cliff diving and getting shot from a cannon.
The competition continues with a 500-mile unicycle race (No.27), a backwards
three-legged marathon (No.58) and five-mile bungee jumping from an F-16 (No.82),
finally culminating in No.100, the most grueling trial of all: each contestant
smokes a joint and then has to talk to his mother on the phone. In case
of a tie, the winner is decided by paper-rock-scissors (best two out of three).
And now, a look
back at:
Significant events that took place during the second week of February
throughout history:
February 12th, 11,000,000,002 BC: Big Bang occurs. Universe comes into being.
February 13th, 11,000,000,002 BC: "Three-Card
Monte" invented.
February 9th, 25,117 BC: Lascaux cave paintings
completed.
February 10th, 25,117 BC: Mysterious
inscription is scratched in stone at mouth of cave in Lascaux, later to be
deciphered by archaeologists as saying "I don't know a lot about bison,
but I know what I like and my 4-year-old son can paint better than that."
February 12th, 10,955 BC: Migration of first
Indian tribe across Siberian land bridge. Inuit chief gets to northern
Alaska, sees snow and ice to the vanishing point, nothing but raw seal fat to
eat, says to tribe "Let's stay here!"
February 13th, 10,953 BC: Mutinous former
Inuit tribesmen arrive in Acapulco, discover white sand beaches, gold,
chocolate and cheap, delicious Mexican food, found what will later become the
Aztec Empire. They are believed to have brought the ritual of human
sacrifice with them.
February 10th, 5,357 BC: Wheel invented in cradle of
civilization, Mesopotamia.
February 14th, 5,357 BC: Blue dashboard light invented,
Mesopotamia.
February 14th, 5,356 BC: First overpopulation crisis in
human history, Mesopotamia. Forced migration spreads civilization to
Egypt and Mediterranean basin.
February 8th, 4,101 BC: In Greece, 9-year-old Homer
plays with a stick, pokes out both eyes, is blinded. Decides to devote
his life to poetry instead of soccer.
February 8th, 4,071 BC: Homer's mother dies.
Last words: "But would he listen?"
February 11th, 1419 BC: Curse of Tutankhamen
pronounced. Egyptologists later determine that the young king's exact words
were: "Fer Ra's sake, where did I leave my goddamn sandals?!"
February 9th, 236 BC: Rosetta Stone carved in
Luxor. First known use of rhymes "love/above",
"world/girl" and "arms/charms".
February 11th, 157 BC: First public pay toilet in
history opens in ancient Rome.
February 12th, 157 BC: Wisenus Himerus of Pompeii
writes poem "Here sit I, broken of heart..."
February 8th, 30 AD: Christ of Nazareth dies.
Career takes off. Ancient Roman publicity agents take note.
February 10th, 30 AD: Larry Digliani of Tuscany hits
thumb with bronze hammer, becomes the first to say "Jesus H. Christ!"
February 10th, 30 AD: Larry's brother Curly becomes
the first to ask "What does the 'H' stand for?"
February 9th, 455: Aztec descendants of mutinous former
Inuit tribesmen discover marijuana, coca and peyote.
February 12th, 456: Aztec descendants of mutinous
former Inuit tribesmen invent the street corner so that they have somewhere to
stand around aimlessly with their shoulders hunched. Also invent the
pocket so they have somewhere to shove their hands.
February 11th, 1094: Toilet invented, Europe.
February 11th, 1095: Rise of the ideal of chivalry
in Europe.
February 11th, 1096: Knights, tired of hearing
their wives say "If you're so freakin' chivalrous why can't you put the
damn toilet seat back down once in a while?", depart on First
Crusade. Irish squire Peter O'Noiyudoughnt invents chastity belt just
before departure.
February 8th, 1097: Enraged, sex-starved European knights
arrive in the Holy Land, discover it entirely undefended and nearly
uninhabited. They conquer Jerusalem, kill entire remaining population,
raze every building to the ground, poison the wells and sow salt. Only
surviving Muslim, Hassam Sudein, claims victory.
February 9th, 1098: Knights return to Europe, find
population has doubled in their absence and Moorish peddlers swarming the
continent selling "Sudein's E-Z Pickin's Skeleton Key" at wholesale
prices. They invent the iron maiden and leave, in a huff, on the Second
Crusade.
February 14th, 1454: Marriage of Tomas de Torquemada
to Prudence Chastity Locklips in Madrid, Spain.
February 13th, 1455: Mrs Torquemada refuses for the
364th time to perform oral sex.
February 14th, 1455: Spanish Inquisition begins.
February 10th, 1789: Guillotine invented in France
as "humane means of execution".
February 11th, 1789: Squeegee mop, rubber gloves and
boots, paper towels and the expression "Eeiuw, gross!" invented in
France. Heated debate begins as to whether the severed head sees the basket
coming towards it.
February 8th, 1888: Eastman-Kodak company
introduces first hand-held camera for the general public.
February 9th, 1888: Alex Marte coins the phrase
"Take a picture, it'll last longer!"
February 11th, 1936: Kurt Schrift of Orange, New
Jersey becomes first person to put a tennis ball on a trailer hitch.
February 10th, 1984: "This letter has been
around the world 19 times" chain letter written in Las Vegas by Lotta and
Pierre Stime, asking each recipient to send it out to 20 other people in the
hope of receiving some kind of vague "good luck" in return.
February 10th, 1985: Every single person in the
entire world has received the "This letter has been around the world 19
times" chain letter at least three times by now. Forest reserves
severely depleted on every continent.
February 10th, 1986: Personal computers and modems
begin to proliferate rapidly, eventually giving nearly everyone access to the
Internet.
February 10th, 2005: Entire Internet network breaks
down due to overload of attached files. Investigation reveals that 87% of
them are text files that begin: "This letter has been around the world 19
times"
Special
Last-Minute Flash:
We've all been warned by now of the risks of the so-called "Y2K bug"
whereby starting on January 1st, 2000, your computer will think that it is in
the previous century. The Institute for Scaring You Stiff About Stuff
That Might Turn Out to Be Inconsequential But We Get Such a Kick Out of the
Look on Your Face announced on Thursday that another, hitherto unsuspected
problem might also be lurking in many computers' operating systems.
Called the "Y1.999K bug" because it can manifest itself at any time,
this bug not only causes computers to think that they are in the previous
century, it also causes them to think that they are manual typewriters.
The symptoms of "Y1.999K"
can be seen in files of text documents made on the affected computer.
These include:
Indentations made with spaces instead of tabs
Entire tables made with spaces or, in less severe cases, default tabs
Page breaks made with repeated carriage returns
Failure to use spell checks or other simple utilities
Work done directly on a floppy disk and/or with no backup copy
In the
worst cases, it can also cause computer owners to think that their computers
can think. These manifestations affect the owners themselves, or
sometimes people in their families. The warning signs are:
The belief that a computer is literally some kind
of "electric brain" that can answer any question;
The belief that for every computer sold, someone, somewhere, loses his or her
job;
The belief that you have to know "a lot of math" to use a computer;
The conviction that the Internet is just one big pornography ring;
There
is no remedy for this bug. As a spokesperson for the Institute explained,
"It's comparable to a horse with a broken leg or a person who has
willingly seen 'Cats' more than once. There's nothing anybody can do, and
in most cases the computer, and its owner, must simply be 'put down'."
If you suspect that you might be
suffering from the Y1.999 bug,
please dial this toll-free
number:
1-800-SHO-OTME
©1999 by David
Jaggard. All rights reserved worldwide.