move along, nothing to see here
Jan. 29th, 2008 10:30 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ppfuf"The mark of a truly great mind isn't whether you're right or wrong. It's how well you can weasel out of a jam." -- Cecil Adams, author of The Straight Dope
"There's never enough time to do all the nothing you want." -- Bill Watterson, in Calvin and Hobbes, 1988
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -- Albert Einstein
"Are you offering me the dreary exile of your imagination?" -- Jean Genet, The Maids
"She had been forced into prudence in her youth, she learned romance as she grew older: the natural sequel of an unnatural beginning." -- Jane Austen in Persuasion
"Ninety per cent of true love is acute, ear-burning embarrassment." --Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters, 1990
“I took advantage of a pigeon once.” -- overheard at choir practice
“Symptoms of "Pathological Science"
1. The maximum effect that is observed is produced by a causative agent of barely detectable intensity, and the magnitude of the effect is substantially independent of the intensity of the cause.
2. The effect is of a magnitude that remains close to the limit of detectability, or many measurements are necessary because of the very low statistical significance of the results.
3. There are claims of great accuracy.
4. Fantastic theories contrary to experience are suggested.
5. Criticisms are met by ad hoc excuses thought up on the spur of the moment.
6. The ratio of supporters to critics rises up to somewhere near 50% and then falls gradually into oblivion.”
From a lecture by Irving Langmuir, in 1953. Transcript published in Physics Today, October 1989.
"Women have girlfriends so they don’t have to die of loneliness, waiting for a guy to start a significant conversation." -- Rhonda Raskin
"A subtle joke about a man's character can ruin a reputation faster than an obvious lie." -- Texas Bix Bender in A Cowboy's Guide to Life
"Oh! do not attack me with your watch. A watch is always too fast or too slow. I cannot be dictated to by a watch." -- Jane Austen in Mansfield Park
"One thing is for sure, the sheep is not a creature of the air. They have enormous difficulty in the comparatively simple act of perchin'. (Baaa baaa... flap flap flap ... whoosh ... thud.) Trouble is, sheep are very dim. Once they get an idea in their 'eads, there's no shiftin' it." -- Monty Python
"When marrying, one should ask oneself this question: Do you believe that you will be able to converse well with this woman into your old age?" -- Friedrich Nietzsche
"Modal auxiliaries: any one of the verbs that combine with the main verb to express necessity (must), obligation (should), permission (may), probability (might), possibility (could), ability (can), or tentativeness (would)." -- from Strunk and White's The Elements of Style.
"There's never enough time to do all the nothing you want." -- Bill Watterson, in Calvin and Hobbes, 1988
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -- Albert Einstein
"Are you offering me the dreary exile of your imagination?" -- Jean Genet, The Maids
"She had been forced into prudence in her youth, she learned romance as she grew older: the natural sequel of an unnatural beginning." -- Jane Austen in Persuasion
"Ninety per cent of true love is acute, ear-burning embarrassment." --Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters, 1990
“I took advantage of a pigeon once.” -- overheard at choir practice
“Symptoms of "Pathological Science"
1. The maximum effect that is observed is produced by a causative agent of barely detectable intensity, and the magnitude of the effect is substantially independent of the intensity of the cause.
2. The effect is of a magnitude that remains close to the limit of detectability, or many measurements are necessary because of the very low statistical significance of the results.
3. There are claims of great accuracy.
4. Fantastic theories contrary to experience are suggested.
5. Criticisms are met by ad hoc excuses thought up on the spur of the moment.
6. The ratio of supporters to critics rises up to somewhere near 50% and then falls gradually into oblivion.”
From a lecture by Irving Langmuir, in 1953. Transcript published in Physics Today, October 1989.
"Women have girlfriends so they don’t have to die of loneliness, waiting for a guy to start a significant conversation." -- Rhonda Raskin
"A subtle joke about a man's character can ruin a reputation faster than an obvious lie." -- Texas Bix Bender in A Cowboy's Guide to Life
"Oh! do not attack me with your watch. A watch is always too fast or too slow. I cannot be dictated to by a watch." -- Jane Austen in Mansfield Park
"One thing is for sure, the sheep is not a creature of the air. They have enormous difficulty in the comparatively simple act of perchin'. (Baaa baaa... flap flap flap ... whoosh ... thud.) Trouble is, sheep are very dim. Once they get an idea in their 'eads, there's no shiftin' it." -- Monty Python
"When marrying, one should ask oneself this question: Do you believe that you will be able to converse well with this woman into your old age?" -- Friedrich Nietzsche
"Modal auxiliaries: any one of the verbs that combine with the main verb to express necessity (must), obligation (should), permission (may), probability (might), possibility (could), ability (can), or tentativeness (would)." -- from Strunk and White's The Elements of Style.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
Nice.
Date: 2008-01-30 06:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-11 10:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-15 10:21 pm (UTC)"The mark of a truly great mind isn't whether you're right or wrong. It's how well you can weasel out of a jam." -- Cecil Adams, author of The Straight Dope
“If wishing for a return to "each holiday in its own good time" makes me a Grinch, well then pass the Who Hash. Harrumph” -- Scarlett67
"You're probably going to spend ten, twenty, or more years of your life working for a company that'd kill you and sell your organs if it got the CEO a third gold-plated bathtub for himself and his hookers." -- GMRyujin 29April04
"You can be talented, well-trained, highly experienced, and a loyal employee and they'll still ship your job overseas if it'll let the CEO get more hookers on bath night. And they'll probably make you train the guy taking your job." -- GMRyujin 29April04
"I'm just saying that if it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck,...etc. But then again, it could just be Elton John in a duck suit. We'll just have to wait and see." -- Starving Artist
"I stopped trying to drown my sorrows years ago when I learned that all sorrows can float, several can tread water, some can swim, and a few can perform CPR on their fellow sorrows." -- pinkfreud
no subject
Date: 2008-12-05 09:27 pm (UTC)- "darksasami," on LiveJournal
"It's called a remote because it always is."
-Sitnam's dad
no subject
Date: 2008-12-16 06:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-12 12:40 am (UTC)Still looking for my gruntle, lost 13June01. Current reward offered $.04.
"I have of late--but wherefore I know not--lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours." W. Shakespeare, _Hamlet_
no subject
Date: 2009-04-09 04:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-04-13 12:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-06-10 11:26 pm (UTC)"It's people like that who make you realize how little you've accomplished. It is a sobering thought, for example, that when Mozart was my age, he had been dead for two years." Tom Lehrer
no subject
Date: 2009-06-11 05:30 pm (UTC)"It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit fact." Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in _A Scandal in Bohemia_
"Man is the best computer we can put aboard a spacecraft...and the only one that can be mass-produced with unskilled labor."--Wehrner von Braun
Never underestimate the perversity of inanimate objects.
"The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return." Toulouse-Lautrec in Moulin Rouge
"Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination." -- Oscar Wilde
no subject
Date: 2009-10-06 04:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-07 05:45 pm (UTC)Sunspace in http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=538859
ENGLISH IS TOUGH STUFF by B. Shaw
From:no subject
Date: 2010-02-01 09:00 pm (UTC)- Helen Keller
no subject
Date: 2010-03-08 07:54 pm (UTC)- Lillian Carter (mother of President Jimmy Carter)
I had a rose named after me and I was very flattered until I read the description in the catalog: “not good in a bed, but fine against a wall.”
- Eleanor Roosevelt
The secret of a good sermon is to have a good beginning and a good ending; and to have the two as close together as possible.
- George Burns
Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint.
- Mark Twain
By all means, marry. If you get a good wife, you'll become happy; if you get a bad one, you'll become a philosopher.
- Socrates
I was married by a judge. I should have asked for a jury.
- Groucho Marx
I have never hated a man enough to give his diamonds back.
- Zsa Zsa Gabor
Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four essential food groups: alcohol, caffeine, sugar and fat.
- Alex Levine
My luck is so bad that if I bought a cemetery, people would stop dying.
- Rodney Dangerfield
Money can't buy you happiness, but it does bring you a more pleasant form of misery.
- Spike Milligan
I don't feel old. In fact, I don't feel anything until noon. Then it's time for my nap.
- Bob Hope
I never drink water because of the disgusting things that fish do in it.
- W. C. Fields
Don't worry about avoiding temptation. As you grow older, it will avoid you.
- Winston Churchill
Maybe it's true that life begins at fifty, but everything else starts to wear out, fall out or spread out.
- Phyllis Diller
no subject
Date: 2010-05-02 03:41 pm (UTC)Boyfriend becomes dependant on me for survivial
(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2010-06-30 04:14 pm (UTC)-- iampunha on http://www.giraffeboards.com/showthread.php?t=13378
no subject
Date: 2010-07-23 06:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 07:53 pm (UTC)-- Cat Whisperer, on the SDMB
no subject
Date: 2011-03-15 11:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-25 11:09 pm (UTC)I loved you, helplessly, with a boundless tongue-tied love.
And death doesn't prevent me from loving you.
Besides,
in my opinion you aren't dead.
(I know dead people, and you are not dead.)
-- Franz Wright
no subject
Date: 2011-11-04 09:33 pm (UTC)1. Don’t put drugs in people’s drinks in order to control their behavior.
2. When you see someone walking by themselves, leave them alone!
3. If you pull over to help someone with car problems, remember not to assault them!
4. NEVER open an unlocked door or window uninvited.
5. If you are in an elevator and someone else gets in, DON’T ASSAULT THEM!
6. Remember, people go to laundry to do their laundry, do not attempt to molest someone who is alone in a laundry room.
7. USE THE BUDDY SYSTEM! If you are not able to stop yourself from assaulting people, ask a friend to stay with you while you are in public.
8. Always be honest with people! Don’t pretend to be a caring friend in order to gain the trust of someone you want to assault. Consider telling them you plan to assault them. If you don’t communicate your intentions, the other person may take that as a sign that you do not plan to rape them.
9. Don’t forget: you can’t have sex with someone unless they are awake!
10. Carry a whistle! If you are worried you might assault someone “on accident” you can hand it to the person you are with, so they can blow it if you do.
And, ALWAYS REMEMBER: if you didn’t ask permission and then respect the answer the first time, you are commiting a crime- no matter how “into it” others appear to be.
no subject
Date: 2012-04-06 04:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-01 07:37 pm (UTC)said by Really Not All That Bright in http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=511831&page=142
no subject
Date: 2013-03-18 03:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-09-04 07:05 pm (UTC)http://xkcd.com/1141/ "next year"
no subject
Date: 2014-06-30 07:57 pm (UTC)― Margaret Atwood, Cat's Eye
no subject
Date: 2015-01-09 09:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-01-10 04:43 pm (UTC)http://www.themarysue.com/voltaire-beatrice-evelyn-hall/
no subject
Date: 2015-01-20 09:58 pm (UTC)posted by TonySinclair on the SDMB
no subject
Date: 2015-01-29 12:11 am (UTC)--Qadgop the Mercotan (SDMB)
I hear the sound of wings
Date: 2015-03-06 09:10 pm (UTC)Like the recovery of a sick man,
Like going forth into a garden after sickness.
Death is before me today:
Like the odor of myrrh,
Like sitting under a sail in a good wind.
Death is before me today:
Like the course of a stream,
Like the return of a man from the war-galley to his house.
Death is before me today:
Like the home that a man longs to see,
After years spent as a captive.
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 1: Preludes and Nocturnes
no subject
Date: 2015-03-27 06:53 pm (UTC)--desperance (Chaz)
no subject
Date: 2015-05-31 09:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-12-23 04:51 pm (UTC)on asking for things
Date: 2016-02-02 09:52 pm (UTC)We don't want the have-nots asking for things because it puts the haves in the uncomfortable situation to say "No". To make it easier on the haves, we shame the have-nots into silence.
no subject
Date: 2017-01-30 09:32 pm (UTC)http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=817599