General Wisdom

"There is hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags do not wave in a vacuum."

— Arthur C. Clarke

There is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress.

— Mark Twain

There is no realizable power that man cannot, in time, fashion the tools to attain, nor any power so secure that the naked ape will not abuse it. So it is written in the genetic cards -- only physics and war hold him in check. And also the wife who wants him home by five, of course.

— Encyclopedia Apocryphia, 1990 ed.

"There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in their home."

— Ken Olson, President of DEC, World Future Society Convention, 1977

There is no satisfaction in hanging a man who does not object to it

— G. B. Shaw

There is no substitute for good manners, except, perhaps, fast reflexes.

There is no such thing as fortune. Try again.

There is no time like the pleasant.

There is no time like the present for postponing what you ought to be doing.

There is no TRUTH. There is no REALITY. There is no CONSISTENCY. There are no ABSOLUTE STATEMENTS I'm very probably wrong.

"There is nothing which cannot be answered by means of my doctrine," said a monk, coming into a teahouse where Nasrudin sat. "And yet just a short time ago, I was challenged by a scholar with an unanswerable question," said Nasrudin. "I could have answered it if I had been there." "Very well. He asked, 'Why are you breaking into my house in the middle of the night?'"

There is nothing wrong with Southern California that a rise in the ocean level wouldn't cure.

— Ross MacDonald

There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.

— Oscar Wilde

There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.

— Mark Twain

There once was a girl named Irene Who lived on distilled kerosene But she started absorbin' A new hydrocarbon And since then has never benzene.

There once was an old man from Esser, Who's knowledge grew lesser and lesser. It at last grew so small, He knew nothing at all, And now he's a College Professor.

"There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it."

— C. S. Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia

There was a plane crash over mid-ocean, and only three survivors were left in the life-raft: the Pope, the President, and Mayor Daley. Unfortunately, it was a one-man life-raft, and quickly sinking, so they started debating who should be allowed to stay. The Pope pointed out that he was the spiritual leader of millions all over the world, the President explained that if he died then America would be stuck with the Vice-President, and so forth. Then Mayor Daley said, "Look! We're not solving anything like this! The only fair thing to do is to vote on it." So they did, and Mayor Daley won by 97 votes.

There was a young lady from Hyde Who ate a green apple and died. While her lover lamented The apple fermented And made cider inside her inside.

There was a young man who said "God, I find it exceedingly odd, That the willow oak tree Continues to be, When there's no one about in the Quad." "Dear Sir, your astonishment's odd, For I'm always about in the Quad; And that's why the tree, Continues to be," Signed "Yours faithfully, God."

There was a young poet named Dan, Whose poetry never would scan. When told this was so, He said, "Yes, I know.

"There was an interesting development in the CBS-Westmoreland trial: both sides agreed that after the trial, Andy Rooney would be allowed to talk to the jury for three minutes about little things that annoyed him during the trial."

— David Letterman

There were in this country two very large monopolies. The larger of the two had the following record: the Vietnam War, Watergate, double- digit inflation, fuel and energy shortages, bankrupt airlines, and the 8-cent postcard. The second was responsible for such things as the transistor, the solar cell, lasers, synthetic crystals, high fidelity stereo recording, sound motion pictures, radio astronomy, negative feedback, magnetic tape, magnetic "bubbles", electronic switching systems, microwave radio and TV relay systems, information theory, the first electrical digital computer, and the first communications satellite. Guess which one got to tell the other how to run the telephone business?

There's a fine line between courage and foolishness. Too bad it's not a fence.

There's an old proverb that says just about whatever you want it to.

There's little in taking or giving, There's little in water or wine: This living, this living, this living, Was never a project of mine. Oh, hard is the struggle, and sparse is The gain of the one at the top, For art is a form of catharsis, And love is a permanent flop, And work is the province of cattle, And rest's for a clam in a shell, So I'm thinking of throwing the battle -- Would you kindly direct me to hell?

— Dorothy Parker

There's no easy quick way out, we're gonna have to live through our whole lives, win, lose, or draw.

— Walt Kelly

There's no future in time travel

There's no point in being grown up if you can't be childish sometimes.

— Dr. Who

There's no room in the drug world for amateurs.

There's no trick to being a humorist when you have the whole government working for you.

— Will Rodgers

"There's nothing in the middle of the road but a yellow stripe and dead armadillos."

— Jim Hightower, Texas Agricultural Commissioner

"There's nothing wrong with teenagers that reasoning with them won't aggravate."

There's only one way to have a happy marriage and as soon as I learn what it is I'll get married again.

— Clint Eastwood

There's so much plastic in this culture that vinyl leopard skin is becoming an endangered synthetic.

— Lily Tomlin

"These are DARK TIMES for all mankind's HIGHEST VALUES!" "These are DARK TIMES for FREEDOM and PROSPERITY!" "These are GREAT TIMES to put your money on BAD GUY to kick the CRAP out of MEGATON MAN!"

These days the necessities of life cost you about three times what they used to, and half the time they aren't even fit to drink.

They also surf who only stand on waves.

"They make a desert and call it peace."

— Tacitus (55?-120?)

They spell it "da Vinci" and pronounce it "da Vinchy". Foreigners always spell better than they pronounce.

— Mark Twain

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

— Benjamin Franklin, 1759

"They told me I was gullible ... and I believed them!"

They told me you had proven it When they discovered our results About a month before. Their hair began to curl The proof was valid, more or less Instead of understanding it But rather less than more. We'd run the thing through PRL. He sent them word that we would try Don't tell a soul about all this To pass where they had failed For it must ever be And after we were done, to them A secret, kept from all the rest The new proof would be mailed. Between yourself and me. My notion was to start again Ignoring all they'd done We quickly turned it into code To see if it would run.

They're only trying to make me LOOK paranoid!

"They're unfriendly, which is fortunate, really. They'd be difficult to like."

— Avon

Things are more like they used to be than they are now.

Things will be bright in P.M. A cop will shine a light in your face.

Think big. Pollute the Mississippi.

Think honk if you're a telepath.

Think of it! With VLSI we can pack 100 ENIACs in 1 sq. cm.!

Think of your family tonight. Try to crawl home after the computer crashes.

Think twice before speaking, but don't say "think think click click".

"Thirty days hath Septober, April, June, and no wonder. all the rest have peanut butter except my father who wears red suspenders."

This Fortue Examined By INSPECTOR NO. 2-14

This fortune intentionally not included.

This fortune is false.

This fortune is inoperative. Please try another.

"This is a country where people are free to practice their religion, regardless of race, creed, color, obesity, or number of dangling keys ..."

"This is a job for BOB VIOLENCE and SCUM, the INCREDIBLY STUPID MUTANT DOG."

— Bob Violence

"This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. If this had been an actual emergency, do you really think we'd stick around to tell you?"

This is an especially good time for you vacationers who plan to fly, because the Reagan administration, as part of the same policy under which it recently sold Yellowstone National Park to Wayne Newton, has "deregulated" the airline industry. What this means for you, the consumer, is that the airlines are no longer required to follow any rules whatsoever. They can show snuff movies. They can charge for oxygen. They can hire pilots right out of Vending Machine Refill Person School. They can conserve fuel by ejecting husky passengers over water. They can ram competing planes in mid-air. These innovations have resulted in tremendous cost savings which have been passed along to you, the consumer, in the form of flights with amazingly low fares, such as $29. Of course, certain restrictions do apply, the main one being that all these flights take you to Newark, and you must pay thousands of dollars if you want to fly back out.

— Dave Barry, "Iowa -- Land of Secure Vacations"

This is an unauthorized cybernetic announcement.

This is for all ill-treated fellows Unborn and unbegot, For them to read when they're in trouble And I am not.

— A. E. Housman

"This is lemma 1.1. We start a new chapter so the numbers all go back to one."

— Prof. Seager, C&O 351

This is National Non-Dairy Creamer Week.

THIS IS PLEDGE WEEK FOR THE FORTUNE PROGRAM If you like the fortune program, why not support it now with your contribution of a pithy fortune, clean or obscene? We cannot continue without your support. Less than 14\% of all fortune users are contributors. That means that 86\% of you are getting a free ride. We can't go on like this much longer. Federal cutbacks mean less money for fortunes, and unless user contributions increase to make up the difference, the fortune program will have to shut down between midnight and 8 a.m. Don't let this happen. Mail your fortunes right now to "fortune". Just type in your favorite pithy saying. Do it now before you forget. Our target is 300 new fortunes by the end of the week. Don't miss out. All fortunes will be acknowledged. If you contribute 30 fortunes or more, you will receive a free subscription to "The Fortune Hunter", our monthly program guide. If you contribute 50 or more, you will receive a free "Fortune Hunter" coffee mug ....

This is the first numerical problem I ever did. It demonstrates the power of computers: Enter lots of data on calorie & nutritive content of foods. Instruct the thing to maximize a function describing nutritive content, with a minimum level of each component, for fixed caloric content. The results are that one should eat each day: 1/2 chicken 1 egg 1 glass of skim milk 27 heads of lettuce.

— Rev. Adrian Melott

This is the story of the bee Whose sex is very hard to see You cannot tell the he from the she But she can tell, and so can he The little bee is never still She has no time to take the pill And that is why, in times like these There are so many sons of bees.

This is your fortune.

This land is full of trousers! this land is full of mausers! And pussycats to eat them when the sun goes down!

— Firesign Theater

This land is made of mountains, This land is made of mud, This land has lots of everything, For me and Elmer Fudd. This land has lots of trousers, This land has lots of mousers, And pussycats to eat them When the sun goes down.

This life is a test. It is only a test. Had this been an actual life, you would have received further instructions as to what to do and where to go.

This login session: $13.99, but for you $11.88

This novel is not to be tossed lightly aside, but to be hurled with great force.

— Dorothy Parker

This planet has -- or rather had -- a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.

— Douglas Adams

"This process can check if this value is zero, and if it is, it does something child-like."

— Forbes Burkowski, Computer Science 454

This quote is taken from the Diamondback, the University of Maryland student newspaper, of Tuesday, 3/10/87. One disadvantage of the Univac system is that it does not use Unix, a recently developed program which translates from one computer language to another and has a built-in editing system which identifies errors in the original program.

This sentence contradicts itself -- no actually it doesn't.

— Hofstadter

... This striving for excellence extends into people's personal lives as well. When '80s people buy something, they buy the best one, as determined by (1) price and (2) lack of availability. Eighties people buy imported dental floss. They buy gourmet baking soda. If an '80s couple goes to a restaurant where they have made a reservation three weeks in advance, and they are informed that their table is available, they stalk out immediately, because they know it is not an excellent restaurant. If it were, it would have an enormous crowd of excellence-oriented people like themselves waiting, their beepers going off like crickets in the night. An excellent restaurant wouldn't have a table ready immediately for anybody below the rank of Liza Minnelli.

— Dave Barry, "In Search of Excellence"

Thompson, if he is to be believed, has sampled the entire rainbow of legal and illegal drugs in heroic efforts to feel better than he does. As for the truth about his health: I have asked around about it. I am told that he appears to be strong and rosy, and steadily sane. But we will be doing what he wants us to do, I think, if we consider his exterior a sort of Dorian Gray facade. Inwardly, he is being eaten alive by tinhorn politicians. The disease is fatal. There is no known cure. The most we can do for the poor devil, it seems to me, is to name his disease in his honor. From this moment on, let all those who feel that Americans can be as easily led to beauty as to ugliness, to truth as to public relations, to joy as to bitterness, be said to be suffering from Hunter Thompson's disease. I don't have it this morning. It comes and goes. This morning I don't have Hunter Thompson's disease.

— Kurt Vonnegut Jr. on Dr. Hunter S. Thompson: Excerpt from "A Political Disease", Vonnegut's review of "Fear and Loathing

Those of you who think you know everything are very annoying to those of us who do.

Those who can't write, write manuals.

Those who can, do. Those who can't, simulate.

"Those who do not do politics will be done in by politics."

— French Proverb

Those who do not understand Unix are condemned to reinvent it, poorly.

— Henry Spencer

Those who educate children well are more to be honored than parents, for these only gave life, those the art of living well.

— Aristotle

Those who express random thoughts to legislative committees are often surprised and appalled to find themselves the instigators of law.

— Mark B. Cohen

Those who in quarrels interpose, must often wipe a bloody nose.

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.

— John F. Kennedy

Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation, are men who want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the roar of its many waters.

— Frederick Douglass

Three great scientific theories of the structure of the universe are the molecular, the corpuscular and the atomic. A fourth affirms, with Haeckel, the condensation or precipitation of matter from ether -- whose existence is proved by the condensation or precipitation ... A fifth theory is held by idiots, but it is doubtful if they know any more about the matter than the others.

— Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"

Time flies like an arrow Fruit flies like a banana

Time flies like an arrow, but fruit flies like a banana.

Time is an illusion; lunchtime, doubly so.

— Ford Prefect

Time is nature's way of making sure that everything doesn't happen at once.

'Tis the dream of each programmer, Before his life is done, To write three lines of APL, And make the damn things run.

(to "The Caissons Go Rolling Along") Scratch the disks, dump the core, Shut it down, pull the plug Roll the tapes across the floor, Give the core an extra tug And the system is going to crash. And the system is going to crash. Teletypes smashed to bits. Mem'ry cards, one and all, Give the scopes some nasty hits Toss out halfway down the hall And the system is going to crash. And the system is going to crash. And we've also found Just flip one switch When you turn the power down, And the lights will cease to twitch You turn the disk readers into trash. And the tape drives will crumble in a flash. Oh, it's so much fun, When the CPU Now the CPU won't run Can print nothing out but "foo," And the system is going to crash. The system is going to crash.

To A Quick Young Fox: Why jog exquisite bulk, fond crazy vamp, Daft buxom jonquil, zephyr's gawky vice? Guy fed by work, quiz Jove's xanthic lamp -- Zow! Qualms by deja vu gyp fox-kin thrice.

— Lazy Dog

To be intoxicated is to feel sophisticated but not be able to say it.

"To be responsive at this time, though I will simply say, and therefore this is a repeat of what I said previously, that which I am unable to offer in response is based on information available to make no such statement."

To be sure of hitting the target, shoot first and, whatever you hit, call it the target.

To err is human, to forgive is Not Company Policy.

"To err is human, to forgive, beyond the scope of the Operating System"

To err is human, to moo bovine.

To every Ph.D. there is an equal and opposite Ph.D.

— B. Duggan

To generalize is to be an idiot.

— William Blake

To get something done, a committee should consist of no more than three men, two of them absent.

To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk.

— Thomas Edison

To iterate is human, to recurse, divine.

To the best of my recollection, Senator, I can't recall.

To the systems programmer, users and applications serve only to provide a test load.

To those accustomed to the precise, structured methods of conventional system development, exploratory development techniques may seem messy, inelegant, and unsatisfying. But it's a question of congruence: precision and flexibility may be just as disfunctional in novel, uncertain situations as sloppiness and vacillation are in familiar, well-defined ones. Those who admire the massive, rigid bone structures of dinosaurs should remember that jellyfish still enjoy their very secure ecological niche.

— Beau Sheil, "Power Tools for Programmers"

To understand this important story, you have to understand how the telephone company works. Your telephone is connected to a local computer, which is in turn connected to a regional computer, which is in turn connected to a loudspeaker the size of a garbage truck on the lawn of Edna A. Bargewater of Lawrence, Kan. Whenever you talk on the phone, your local computer listens in. If it suspects you're going to discuss an intimate topic, it notifies the computer above it, which listens in and decides whether to alert the one above it, until finally, if you really humiliate yourself, maybe break down in tears and tell your closest friend about a sordid incident from your past involving a seedy motel, a neighbor's spouse, an entire religious order, a garden hose and six quarts of tapioca pudding, the top computer feeds your conversation into Edna's loudspeaker, and she and her friends come out on the porch to listen and drink gin and laugh themselves silly.

— Dave Barry, "Won't It Be Just Great Owning Our Own Phones?"

"To vacillate or not to vacillate, that is the question ... or is it?"

"To YOU I'm an atheist; to God, I'm the Loyal Opposition."

— Woody Allen

Today is a good day to bribe a high-ranking public official.

Today is National Existential Ennui Awareness Day.

Today is the first day of the rest of the mess

Today is the first day of the rest of your lossage.

Today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday

Today's scientific question is: What in the world is electricity? And where does it go after it leaves the toaster?

— Dave Barry, "What is Electricity?"

"Today's thrilling story has been brought to you by Mushies, the great new cereal that gets soggy even without milk or cream. Join us soon for more spectacular adventure starring ... Tippy, the Wonder Dog."

— Bob & Ray

"Today, of course, it is considered very poor taste to use the F-word except in major motion pictures."

— Dave Barry, "$#$\%#^\%!^\%&@\%@!"

Tomorrow will be canceled due to lack of interest.

Tonight's the night: Sleep in a eucalyptus tree.

Too clever is dumb.

— Ogden Nash

Too much of a good thing is WONDERFUL.

— Mae West

Too much of everything is just enough.

— Bob Wier

Too often I find that the volume of paper expands to fill the available briefcases.

— Governor Jerry Brown

Top scientists agree that with the present rate of consumption, the earth's supply of gravity will be exhausted before the 24th century. As man struggles to discover cheaper alternatives, we need your help. Please... CONSERVE GRAVITY Follow these simple suggestions: (1) Walk with a light step. Carry helium balloons if possible. (2) Use tape, magnets, or glue instead of paperweights. (3) Give up skiing and skydiving for more horizontal sports like curling. (4) Avoid showers .. take baths instead. (5) Don't hang all your clothes in the closet ... Keep them in one big pile. (6) Stop flipping pancakes

Travel important today; Internal Revenue men arrive tomorrow.

Troubled day for virgins over 16 who are beautiful and wealthy and live in eucalyptus trees.

Truly great madness can not be achieved without significant intelligence.

— Henrik Tikkanen

Truth is the most valuable thing we have -- so let us economize it.

— Mark Twain

Truth will be out this morning. (Which may really mess things up.)

Truthful, adj.: Dumb and illiterate.

— Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"

Try not to have a good time ... This is supposed to be educational.

— Charles Schulz

Try to be the best of whatever you are, even if what you are is no good.

Try to find the real tense of the report you are reading: Was it done, is it being done, or is something to be done? Reports are now written in four tenses: past tense, present tense, future tense, and pretense. Watch for novel uses of CONGRAM (CONtractor GRAMmer), defined by the imperfect past, the insufficient present, and the absolutely perfect future.

— Amrom Katz

Try to get all of your posthumous medals in advance.

Trying to be happy is like trying to build a machine for which the only specification is that it should run noiselessly.

Trying to define yourself is like trying to bite your own teeth.

— Alan Watts

Turnaucka's Law: The attention span of a computer is only as long as its electrical cord.

Tussman's Law: Nothing is as inevitable as a mistake whose time has come.

TV is chewing gum for the eyes.

— Frank Lloyd Wright

'Twas midnight, and the UNIX hacks Did gyre and gimble in their cave All mimsy was the CS-VAX And Cory raths outgrabe. "Beware the software rot, my son! The faults that bite, the jobs that thrash! Beware the broken pipe, and shun The frumious system crash!"

'Twas the Night before Crisis 'Twas the night before crisis, and all through the house, Not a program was working not even a browse. The programmers were wrung out too mindless to care, Knowing chances of cutover hadn't a prayer. The users were nestled all snug in their beds, While visions of inquiries danced in their heads. When out in the lobby there arose such a clatter, I sprang from my tube to see what was the matter. And what to my wondering eyes should appear, But a Super Programmer, oblivious to fear. More rapid than eagles, his programs they came, And he whistled and shouted and called them by name; On Update! On Add! On Inquiry! On Delete! On Batch Jobs! On Closing! On Functions Complete! His eyes were glazed over, his fingers were lean, From Weekends and nights in front of a screen. A wink of his eye, and a twist of his head, Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread...

'Twas the nocturnal segment of the diurnal period preceding the annual Yuletide celebration, And throughout our place of residence, Kinetic activity was not in evidence among the possessors of this potential, including that species of domestic rodent known as Mus musculus. Hosiery was meticulously suspended from the forward edge of the woodburning caloric apparatus, Pursuant to our anticipatory pleasure regarding an imminent visitation from an eccentric philanthropist among whose folkloric appelations is the honorific title of St. Nicklaus ...

Twenty Percent of Zero is Better than Nothing.

— Walt Kelly

Two can Live as Cheaply as One for Half as Long.

— Howard Kandel

Two percent of zero is almost nothing.

"Two sure ways to tell a sexy male; the first is, he has a bad memory. I forget the second."

Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.

U: There's a U -- a Unicorn! Run right up and rub its horn. Look at all those points you're losing! UMBER HULKS are so confusing.

— The Roguelet's ABC

"Ubi non accusator, ibi non judex." (Where there is no police, there is no speed limit.)

— Roman Law, trans. Petr Beckmann (1971)

UFO's are for real: the Air Force doesn't exist.

"Uncle Cosmo ... why do they call this a word processor?" "It's simple, Skyler ... you've seen what food processors do to food, right?"

— MacNelley, "Shoe"

Uncle Ed's Rule of Thumb: Never use your thumb for a rule. You'll either hit it with a hammer or get a splinter in it.

Uncle Ed's Rule of Thumb: Never use your thumb for a rule. You'll either hit it with a hammmer or get a splinter in it.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison.

— Henry David Thoreau

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison.

— Henry David Thoreau

Under deadline pressure for the next week. If you want something, it can wait. Unless it's blind screaming paroxysmally hedonistic ...

Underlying Principle of Socio-Genetics: Superiority is recessive.

United Nations, New York, December 25. The peace and joy of the Christmas season was marred by a proclamation of a general strike of all the military forces of the world. Panic reigns in the hearts of all the patriots of every persuasion. Meanwhile, fears of universal disaster sank to an all-time low over the world.

— Isaac Asimov

Universe, n.: The problem.

University, n.: Like a software house, except the software's free, and it's usable, and it works, and if it breaks they'll quickly tell you how to fix it, and ...

unix soit qui mal y pense

UNIX was half a billion (500000000) seconds old on Tue Nov 5 00:53:20 1985 GMT (measuring since the time(2) epoch).

— Andy Tannenbaum

Unnamed Law: If it happens, it must be possible.

Unquestionably, there is progress. The average American now pays out twice as much in taxes as he formerly got in wages.

— H. L. Mencken

User n.: A programmer who will believe anything you tell him.

USER, n.: The word computer professionals use when they mean "idiot."

— Dave Barry, "Claw Your Way to the Top"

Using TSO is like kicking a dead whale down the beach.

— S. C. Johnson

Utility is when you have one telephone, luxury is when you have two, opulence is when you have three -- and paradise is when you have none.

— Doug Larson

Vail's Second Axiom: The amount of work to be done increases in proportion to the amount of work already completed.

Valerie: Aww, Tom, you're going maudlin on me ... Tom: I reserve the right to wax maudlin as I wane eloquent ...

— Tom Chapin

Van Roy's Law: An unbreakable toy is useful for breaking other toys.

Vanilla, adj.: Ordinary flavor, standard. See FLAVOR. When used of food, very often does not mean that the food is flavored with vanilla extract! For example, "vanilla-flavored won ton soup" (or simply "vanilla won ton soup") means ordinary won ton soup, as opposed to hot and sour won ton soup.

Velilind's Laws of Experimentation: (1) If reproducibility may be a problem, conduct the test only once. (2) If a straight line fit is required, obtain only two data points.

Veni, Vidi, Visa.

"Verily and forsooth," replied Goodgulf darkly. "In the past year strange and fearful wonders I have seen. Fields sown with barley reap crabgrass and fungus, and even small gardens reject their artichoke hearts. There has been a hot day in December and a blue moon. Calendars are made with a month of Sundays and a blue-ribbon Holstein bore alive two insurance salesmen. The earth splits and the entrails of a goat were found tied in square knots. The face of the sun blackens and the skies have rained down soggy potato chips." "But what do all these things mean?" gasped Frito. "Beats me," said Goodgulf with a shrug, "but I thought it made good copy."

— Harvard Lampoon, "Bored of the Rings"

Very few profundities can be expressed in less than 80 characters.

Vila: "I think I have just made the biggest mistake of my life." Orac: "It is unlikely. I would predict there are far greater mistakes waiting to be made by someone with your obvious talent for it."

Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.

— Salvor Hardin

Virginia law forbids bathtubs in the house; tubs must be kept in the yard.

VIRGO (Aug 23 - Sept 22) Learn something new today, like how to spell or how to count to ten without using your fingers. Be careful dressing this morning. You may be hit by a car later in the day and you wouldn't want to be taken to the doctor's office in some of that old underwear you own.

VIRGO (Aug 23 - Sept 22) You are the logical type and hate disorder. This nitpicking is sickening to your friends. You are cold and unemotional and sometimes fall asleep while making love. Virgos make good bus drivers.

"Virtual" means never knowing where your next byte is coming from.

Virtue is its own punishment.

Vital papers will demonstrate their vitality by spontaneously moving from where you left them to where you can't find them.

Vitamin C deficiency is apauling

VMS is like a nightmare about RXS-11M.

Vote anarchist

VYARZERZOMANIMORORSEZASSEZANSERAREORSES?

"Wagner's music is better than it sounds."

— Mark Twain

Walk softly and carry a megawatt laser.

War hath no fury like a non-combatant.

— Charles Edward Montague

War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ketchup is a vegetable.

WARNING TO ALL PERSONNEL: Firings will continue until morale improves.

WARNING TO ALL PERSONNEL: Firings will continue until morale improves.