From kinzler@cs.indiana.edu Thu Oct 26 20:01:51 1989 Path: iuvax!kinzler From: Stephen Kinzler Newsgroups: rec.humor Subject: Usenet Oracularities #34 Message-ID: <28535@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu> Date: 27 Oct 89 01:01:51 GMT Sender: Stephen Kinzler === 34 =================================================================== Title: Usenet Oracularities #34 Compiled-By: Steve Kinzler Date: 27 Oct 89 01:01:51 GMT To find out how to ask a question of the Usenet Oracle, send mail to: oracle@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu or {ames,rutgers}!iuvax!oracle with the word "help" in the subject line. To receive these postings via mail, send mail to: oracle-request@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu --- 34-01 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > What do you think of Oracle Corporation assuming your name? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } I think there's a good fit! } } Signed, } } The Oracle, also omnipresent and slower 'an hell! --- 34-02 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > can a discipline (like mathematics) feel pain? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Not only can a discipline feel pain, but it _enjoys_ pain. } Especially mathematics. Mathematics (one of the New Gods, a } bunch that The Oracle rather prefers not to associate with. } They just don't have that verve that the Old Gods had.) enjoys } pain so much that it requires is disciples (mathematicians) to } practice sadomasochism, self-torture, and marathon TV sessions } of Three's Company reruns in their spare time. If you know } any mathematicians, you may notice that they never let you } examine their closets. } } Other disciplines that enjoy pain are: } } Rotational Physics } Power Engineering } Manhole Cover Design } Televangelism } Oracle Priesthod (this is the BIG one) } } You owe the Oracle a copy of Zoltowski's Calculus with Analytic } Geometry 2nd Edition and the answers to every odd numbered problem (no } copying from the answer manuals) done in base 63. --- 34-03 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Will it rain tomorrow, in the city where I live? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Yes. When you go outside, take a raincoat, an umbrella, a pair of } galoshes and a medical ID bracelet. The first three items are for the } rain. The fourth is for the bus. } } You owe the Oracle a crosswalk. --- 34-04 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > What is the *real* square root of -1? Don't give me any of this > letter-of- the-alphabet business! And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Damn it Jim! I'm an Oracle, not a mathematician! } } You owe the Oracle the Theme From an Imaginary Western. --- 34-05 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Can I have a job ? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } No, you may not have a job. You must go out and wrest one away from } somebody. Or perhaps you can sweet talk one out of somebody. } } Try this: find the nearest bingo game tonight. If you do not smoke } cigarettes, wear the clothes you like the least. Go to the bingo game, } buy 2 packs of 6-up cards, and don't forget your marker. Carefully } listen to every word the bingo caller utters and watch every move that } he makes. } } Since you were completely fixated on the caller, you forgot to mark your } cards and won nothing. So go home and practice the bingo calling you } learned in front of a mirror. Careful! Remember that the expert bingo } caller never makes any sudden moves. Slow and easy. } } Now think to yourself: "Who is that old geezer anyway and why should HE } have that plum job?" March down to the organization that put on that } bingo game and demand an audition. As soon as they see your smooth } moves and hear your crystal-clear-almost-Frank-Sinatra-ish diction, the } job will be yours. } } The Oracle is pleased to be of assistance. } } Oh, by the way, bingo is put on only by volunteer organizations, so you } will be a volunteer bingo caller, not a paid one. Getting paid turns } out to be more complex. But getting a job, that is doable. --- 34-06 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Oh great and powerful voice of universal wisdom, I am in need of your > scholarly advice. So far today, I've read all the Usenet news, played > 15 games of tetris, checked with the WDHA concert hotline, taken a two > hour lunch, made some popcorn, collected my paycheck, fed the dog and > rotated the tires on my car. What am I supposed to do between now and > quitting time? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Ask your secretary to bring you those reports you were going to look } over this week. When you get them, sit and stare at them for about a } half hour. Finally, when you regain consciousness, stretch and walk } about the room, rereading for the 79th time the words on that bowling } trophy you have on your shelf which everyone hates. Finally, get back } to the desk, wad up three or four of the reports, and see how many shots } you can make into the wastebasket from fifteen feet. Of course, if } you're really bored, you could always do some WORK, but I think you can } find better uses for your time. --- 34-07 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > How can I find true enlightenment? Will it help me to survive midterms? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Constipation is one way of finding true enlightenment. You cannot help } but feel it's weight, as you do the weight of the world. Throughout the } day, it is with you, coloring your judgement of everything, making you } kick small animals, yell at your beloved, and eat TV dinners instead of } filet mignon. } } Then, one day, you escape it's grasp! At once comes a great feeling of } release, as if all the world's cares have fallen from your shoulders! } All is once more light and truth, as it was when you were a child! } Ahhhhhh! } } A good crap will not only help you get through midterms by it's sheer } release, but will also give you some good ideas for answering questions! } } You owe the Oracle three rolls of toilet paper and a stack of National } Geographics. --- 34-08 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Why is it that all the young people are wearing black these days? > What do THEY have to mourn, anyway? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } oy, the things they think they have to mourn! they mourn the having to } watch of the rock all the time. the having to watch the rock in the } morning on the radio! the having to watch the rock in the evening at } the party! so very much the having to watch the rock, never the folk } melody sweet of the home country! they mourn the having to take so much } of the sex, always the sex, never the time with the homework or with the } sleep, always the having to take of the sex. they mourn not having the } horse pleasant for to ride, the beans and cabbages good of the simple } life! much is they have for to mourn, now! --- 34-09 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > I am doing a thesis on the significance of Tannanananagorism in > Betelgeusean political theory. Could you please recommend some > literature on the subject? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } Blortwick's _On Funny Movements With Long Names_ comes immediately to } mind. (Glob from Hell press, 2013 -- a bit old, but still a classic, } and never mind that it was published before Tannanananagore was born, it } has very good coverage of Tannanananagorism.) } } Other sources: } } 2. Pish Chow's _Tannanananagorism_. You don't have to read more than } the first fourty-five volumes. Deterministic House Press. } } 3. Bloody Bat's _Betelgeuse: An Agony in Eight Fits_. Little, Brown. } } 4. Mr. the Toad's _The Red Star_. Klassik Komiks Ink. } } 5. anon. _Sandra the Sex-Starved Slut from Saturn_, E. J. Wiley. } } 6. Caroll, Lewis. _Alice in Wonderland_ (lots of editions.) --- 34-10 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Selected-By: Steve Kinzler The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was: > Which is better background music for a seduction: Mozart or Dr. Lizard? And in response, thus spake the Oracle: } In a typical Mozart composition, exposition comes early, is quickly } repeated, followed by thematic development and leading into a fast and } furious cadenza. You can usually count on two or three climaxes in each } piece. With two hundred years of the classical tradition behind you, } why would you want to try anything else?