Background Image

...

The French Are Not Rude. They Just Happen To Hate You. But That Is No Reason To Bypass This Beautiful Country, Whose Master Chefs Have A Well-deserved Worldwide Reputation For Trying To Trick People Into Eating Snails. Nobody Is Sure How This Got Started. Probably A Couple Of French Master Chefs Were Standing Around One Day, And They Found A Snail, And One Of Them Said: 'i Bet That If We Called This Something Like `escargot,' Tourists Would Eat It.' Then They Had Hearty Laugh, Because 'escargot' Is The French Word For 'fat Crawling Bag Of Phlegm.'

-Dave Barry

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

The French Are Not

Dave Barry

...

The French Are Not Rude. They Just Happen To Hate You. But That Is No Reason To Bypass This Beautiful Country, Whose Master Chefs Have A Well-deserved Worldwide Reputation For Trying To Trick People Into Eating Snails. Nobody Is Sure How This Got Started. Probably A Couple Of French Master Chefs Were Standing Around One Day, And They Found A Snail, And One Of Them Said: 'i Bet That If We Called This Something Like `escargot,' Tourists Would Eat It.' Then They Had Hearty Laugh, Because 'escargot' Is The French Word For 'fat Crawling Bag Of Phlegm.'

Views: 5519

Topic

More From Dave Barry

My Wife, Like Many Women, Actually Likes Wrapping Things. If She Gives You A Gift That Requires Batteries, She Wraps The Batteries Separately, Which To Me Is Very Close To Being A Symptom Of Mental Illness.

Funny Christmas

Florida's Number Three Industry, Behind Tourism And Skin Cancer, Is Voter Fraud.

Miami, You Can Never Run Out Of Material. As Long As You Have Miami Around You, You Will Never, Never Stop Being Amused.

Actually, There Are People From All Ove - Not Just Latin America, Certainly Not Just Cuba, But All Over Europe, All Over The United States. I Like That. I Like Knowing A Lot Of Different Types Of People. And I Can Afford To Live In A Relatively Safe Part Of Miami.

I Took An Estimated Two Thousand Years Of High School French, And When I Finally Got To France, I Discovered That I Didn't Know One Single Phrase That Was Actually Useful In A Real-life French Situation.

Always Remember That If Editors Were So Damned Smart, They Would Know How To Dress.

I Say We Scrap The Current System And Replace It With A System Wherein You Add Your Name To The Bottom Of A List, And Then You Send Some Money To The Person At The Top Of The List, And Then You... Oh, Wait, That Is Our Current System.

That Is The Wasp, Yes. But It Was Captured By Black Stache, And He’s Coming For This Ship Now.” “and How Do You Know That?” Asked Slank. “did A Seagull Tell You?” This Brought Chuckles From The Crew. Something Like That, Thought Peter.

As Americans We Must Always Remember That We All Have A Common Enemy, An Enemy That Is Dangerous, Powerful, And Relentless. I Refer, Of Course, To The Federal Government.

Aside From Velcro, Time Is The Most Mysterious Substance In The Universe. You Can't See It Or Touch It, Yet A Plumber Can Charge You Upwards Of Seventy-five Dollars Per Hour For It, Without Necessarily Fixing Anything.

One Key Lesson Of History Is That Virtually Anything, Including Afternoon Or Evening Thundershowers, Causes Germany To Invade Belgium.

I Shared This Insight With Some Other Boat Owners, And They All Agreed That, Definitely, Putting Your Boar Into The Water Is Asking For Trouble. Most Of Them Have Had Their Boats Sitting In Their Driveways Long Enough To Be Registered Historical Landmarks.

I Actually Like South Florida. I Never Lived In A More Interesting Place Than This. I've Never Met A Wider Range Of People. I Guess When I Came Here I Thought There Were Cubans And Then There Were People From New York And That Was Miami. Now I Know That It's Cubans, People From New York, And Some People From New Jersey.

To Defend Western Europe We Have To Let The Pentagon Buy All These Tanks And Guns And Things, And The Pentagon Is Unable To Buy Any Object That That Costs Less Than A Condominium In Vail. If The Pentagon Needs, Say, Fruit, It Will Argue That It Must Have Fruit That Can Withstand The Rigors Of Combat Conditions, And It Will Wind Up Purchasing The Fx-700 Seedless Tactical Grape, Which Will Cost $160,000 Per Bunch, And Will Have An 83 Percent Failure Rate.

If You Tell Most People What Libertarians Think, They Immediately Assume That You Cannot Mean It All The Way, That You're Really Just Taking A Position For Argument's Sake.

I Have Been A Gigantic Rolling Stones Fan Since Approximately The Spanish-american War.

The United States Tried, By Depressing The Clutch Of Diplomacy And Downshifting The Gearshift Lever Of Rhetoric, To Remain Neutral, But It Became Increasingly Obvious That The Nation Was Going To Get Into A War, Especially Since It Was Almost 1812.

The Internet Is The Most Important Single Development In The History Of Human Communication Since The Invention Of Call Waiting.

You Should Definitely Have A Travel Agent. Why Go Through All The Hassle Of Dealing With Airlines, Hotels, And Rental-car Agencies Yourself, Only To See The Arrangements Get All Screwed Up, When With Just A Single Phone Call You Can Have A Trained Professional Screw Them Up For You?

Canada, As You Know, Is A Major Important Nation Boasting A Sophisticated, Cosmopolitan Culture That Was Tragically Destroyed Last Week By Beavers.

I Argue Very Well. Just Ask Any Of My Remaining Friends.

The World Is Full Of Strange Phenomena That Cannot Be Explained By The Laws Of Logic Or Science. Dennis Rodman Is Only One Example.

Never Have A Dog. Let's Not Beat Around The Bush Here: Dogs Are Morons.

Sharks Are As Tough As Those Football Fans Who Take Their Shirts Off During Games In Chicago In January, Only More Intelligent.

Far Too Often, We Fathers Avoid The Subject Because It's So Awkward. The Subject I Am Referring To Is: Buying Gifts For Women. This Is An Area Where Many Men Do Not Have A Clue. Exhibit A Was My Father, Who Was A Very Thoughtful Man, But Who Once Gave My Mother, On Their Anniversary, The Following Token Of His Love, His Commitment, And-yes-his Passion For Her: An Electric Blanket.

There Comes A Time In A Man's Life When He Hears The Call Of The Sea. If The Man Has A Brain In His Head, He Will Hang Up The Phone Immediately.

I Don't Know What You Can Possibly Do For Less Than $50 To Have Somebody Come In Your House.

American Consumers Have No Problem With Carcinogens, But They Will Not Purchase Any Product, Including Floor Wax, That Has Fat In It.

The Term Sat Is A Set Of Initials, Or Autonym, Standing For Scholastic Attitude Treaty Organization.

The Method (of Learning Japanese) Recommended By Experts Is To Be Born As A Japanese Baby And Raised By A Japanese Family, In Japan. And Even Then It's Not Easy.

The Easiest Way To Make A Fruitcake Is To Buy A Darkish Cake, Then Pound Some Old, Hard Fruit Into It With A Mallet. Be Sure To Wear Safety Glasses.

Today, You're 50. Now We Can Round Your Age Up To 100! Happy 50th Birthday!

Microsoft Has A New Version Out, Windows Xp, Which According To Everybody Is The 'most Reliable Windows Ever.' To Me, This Is Like Saying That Asparagus Is 'the Most Articulate Vegetable Ever.'

The Internet: Transforming Society And Shaping The Future Through Chat.

Europeans, Like Some Americans, Drive On The Right Side Of The Road, Except In England, Where They Drive On Both Sides Of The Road; Italy, Where They Drive On The Sidewalk; And France, Where If Necessary They Will Follow You Right Into The Hotel Lobby.

I Have Come Up With A Sure-fire Concept For A Hit Television Show, Which Would Be Called `a Live Celebrity Gets Eaten By A Shark'.

When I Read That I Had To Go To Gettysburg.

I Think Superman Should Go On The Larry King Show And Announce That He Would Come Back To Life If People In All 50 States Wanted Him To.

What, Exactly, Is The Internet? Basically It Is A Global Network Exchanging Digitized Data In Such A Way That Any Computer, Anywhere, That Is Equipped With A Device Called A 'modem', Can Make A Noise Like A Duck Choking On A Kazoo

Eugene Is Located In Western Oregon, Approximately 278 Billion Miles From Anything.

I Realize That I'm Generalizing Here, But As Is Often The Case When I Generalize, I Don't Care.

Some [soccer] Players Suffer Four Or Five Fatal Injuries Per Game. That's How Tough They Are.

When I Was A Kid, I Thought History Was The Most Boring Subject Of All. I Shouldn't Blame My Teachers; I Should Blame Me, But I'll Blame Them.

It's Income Tax Time Again, Americans: Time To Gather Up Those Receipts, Get Out Those Tax Forms, Sharpen Up That Pencil, And Stab Yourself In The Aorta

Like All Writers, My Greatest Inspiration, My Ultimate Muse, Is A Deadline.

Miami Drivers Will Attempt To Pass You Inside A Car Wash.

Sat Tests Are Designed By Huge Panels Of Experts In Education And Psychology Who Work For Years To Design Tests In Which Not One Single Question Measures Any Bit Of Knowledge That Anyone Might Actually Need In The Real World. We Should Applaud Kids For Getting Lower Scores.

Thus The White Men And Native Americans Were Able, Through The Spirit Of Goodwill And Compromise, To Reach The First In What Would Become A Long Series Of Mutually Beneficial, Breached Agreements That Enabled The Two Cultures To Coexist Peacefully For Stretches Of Twenty And Sometimes Even Thirty Days, After Which It Was Usually Necessary To Negotiate New Agreements That Would Be Even More Mutual And Beneficial, Until Eventually The Native Americans Were Able To Perceive The Vast Mutual Benefits Of Living In Rock-strewn Sectors Of South Dakota.

Native American

If Everybody Were A Guy, The Human Race Could Easily Get By On Less Than One Twentieth The Current Number Of Shoes.

For A While I Got Into The South Pacific Theater Of World War Ii. I Read "american Caesar" By William Manchester, The Biography Of General Macarthur. Because Of That I Ended Up Reading "tales Of The South Pacific" By James Michener And Then Because Of That Reading His "hawaii." That Is What Happens.

Earnest Is Our Dog. She Senses Instantly That Something Is Wrong, And Guided By That Timeless And Unerring Nurturing Instinct That All Female Dogs Have, She Tries To Lick My Ears Off.

And Now, The Superstore - Unequaled In Size, Unmatched In Variety, Unrivaled Inconvenience.

How Can You Be Afraid Of Women?” “those Ain’t Normal Women.

I Have Read That, On The Average, The Japanese Are Getting Taller, But At The Moment They Seem To Be About The Same Height As American Junior-high-school Students, Only With Fewer Guns.

Here's A Man Who Was Twice Elected To The Most Powerful Position On Earth Despite Needing A Teleprompter To Correctly Identify What Year It Was.

Found A Smoldering Cigarette Left By A Horse.

The Russians Will Never Be Able To Get Their Missiles Thought The Dense Protective Layer Of Delayed Flights Circling Over The United States In Complex, Puke-inducing Holding Patterns.

Without Computers, The Government Would Be Unable To Function At The Level Of Effectiveness And Efficiency That We Have Come To Expect. . . . Today's Government Uses Computers Which Are Capable Of Cranking Out Millions Of Documents Per Day Without Any Regard Whatsoever For Their Content, Thereby Freeing Government Employees For More Important Responsibilities, Such As Not Answering Their Phones.

Spain Travel Tip: If Bathroom Genders Are Indicated By Flamingos, The Boy Flamingo Is The One With A Hat. I Learned This The Hard Way.

Sign At A Tennessee Highway: When This Sign Is Under Water, This Road Is Impassable.

I Realize That There Are Certain Hardships That Only Females Must Endure, Such As Childbirth, Waiting In Lines For Public-restroom Stalls, And A Crippling, Psychotic Obsession With Shoe Color. Also, Females Tend To Reach Emotional Maturity Very Quickly, So That By Age 7 They Are No Longer Capable Of Seeing The Humor In Loud Inadvertent Public Blasts Of Flatulence, Whereas Males Can Continue To Derive Vast Enjoyment From This Well Into Their 80s.

The Japanese, Implementing A Complex, Long-term, And Ultimately Successful Strategy To Dominate The U S Consumer-electronics Market, Attacked Pearl Harbor.

Electricity Is Actually Made Up Of Extremely Tiny Particles Called Electrons, That You Cannot See With The Naked Eye Unless You Have Been Drinking.

Smee! Raise The Ladies!

Reading... A Vacation For The Mind.

Sign At A Kentucky Appliance Store: Don't Kill Your Wife. Let Our Washing Machine Do The Dirty Work.

We'll Try To Cooperate Fully With The Irs, Because, As Citizens, We Feel A Strong Patriotic Duty Not To Go To Jail.

The Newspaper Industry When I Came Along In The Mid-70s Was Rich And Powerful And Growing And Hungry For Material And Open To New People. None Of That Is True In The Newspaper Industry Today. Print In General Is Pretty Rugged. The Good Thing Is That You Can Gain A Foothold On The Internet Because Everybody Has Access To It, Even Things Like Twitter - I Mean, You Can Get A Reputation For Being Funny Pretty Quickly On Twitter, On A Blog, That Kind Of Thing.

Dogs Feel Very Strongly That They Should Always Go With You In The Car, In Case The Need Should Arise For Them To Bark Violently At Nothing Right In Your Ear.

People Don't Like It When You Make Fun Of A Celebrity. When You Make Fun Of A Celebrity, You'll Hear From Really Loyal Fans Of That Celebrity.

Leonard Aster Thanked Fighting Prawn And The Mollusk Tribe For Their Hospitality. “you Mean,” Said Fighting Prawn, “for Not Killing You?” “yes,” Said Leonard. “it Was Very Gracious Of You.” “do You,” Said Leonard, “i Mean, Does You Tribe, Shake Hands?” “no,” Said Fighting Prawn. “we Kiss On The Lips.” “oh,” Said Leonard, Looking Very Alarmed.

The Porpoises Said Hello To Molly. She Told Them All Her Teeth Were Green.

The Basic Roman Ruin Design Is A Pile Of Rocks With A Little Plaque Saying "roman Ruins" And A Group Of Tourists Frowning At It And Wishing They Were Back At The Hotel Bar.

On Behalf Of The Newspaper Industry I Wish To Announce Some Changes We're Making To Serve You Better. When I Say 'serve You Better,'' I Mean 'increase Our Profits.' We Newspapers Are Very Big On Profits These Days. We're A Business, Just Like Any Other Business, Except That We Employ English Majors.

I Don't Even Care What Bill Bryson Writes About Because He Will Make It Interesting. I Love "a Walk In The Woods," About The Appalachian Trail, But His Most Amazing Book Is "a Short History Of Nearly Everything."

It Is A Scientific Fact That Your Body Will Not Absorb Cholesterol If You Take It From Another Person's Plate.

At The Height Of Rush Hour, People On The London Underground Actually Say "excuse Me." Imagine What Would Happen If You Tried An Insane Stunt Like That On The New York City Subway. The Other Passengers Would Take It As A Sign Of Weakness, And There'd Be A Fight Over Who Got To Keep Your Ears As A Trophy.

Several Years Ago We Had An Intern Who Was None Too Swift. One Day He Was Typing And Turned To A Secretary And Said, "i'm Almost Out Of Typing Paper. What Do I Do?" "just Use Copier Machine Paper," She Told Him. With That, The Intern Took His Last Remaining Blank Piece Of Paper, Put It On The Photocopier And Proceeded To Make Five Blank Copies.

Software Is Usually Accompanied By Documentation In The Form Of Big Fat Scary Manuals That Nobody Ever Reads. In Fact, For The Past Five Years Most Of The Manuals Shipped With Software Products Have Actually Been Copies Of Stephen King's The Stand With New Covers Pasted On.

Love And Pregnancy And Riding On A Camel Cannot Be Hid

Black Stache Had No Love For The Queen, No Love For Women Of Any Sort, Except For His Ma. He Had A Real Soft Spot For His Ma, And Was Truly Sorry For The Time He’d Marooned Her.

We Journalists... Are Also Extremely Impressed With Scientists, And We Will, Frankly, Print Just About Any Wacky Thing They Tell Us, Especially If It Involves Outer Space.

Guys Are Simple... Women Are Not Simple And They Always Assume That Men Must Be Just As Complicated As They Are, Only Way More Mysterious. The Whole Point Is Guys Are Not Thinking Much. They Are Just What They Appear To Be. Tragically.

It Was You Readers Who Really Came Through, Proving Once Again That When The American People Decide To "get Involved" In A Problem, It Is Best Not To Let Them Have Any Sharp Implements.

If Black Stache Laughed, You Laughed. If He Snarled, You Snarled. If He Breathed In Your Direction, You Ran For Cover.

Just Get On Any Major Highway, And Eventually It Will Dead-end In A Disney Parking Area Large Enough To Have Its Own Climate, Populated By Large Nomadic Families Who Have Been Trying To Find Their Cars Since The Carter Administration.

The Democrats Seem To Be Basically Nicer People, But They Have Demonstrated Time And Again That They Have The Management Skills Of Celery.

Sign At A New England Church: Will The Last Person To Leave Please See That The Perpetual Light Is Extinguished?

The Fact That Gene Weingarten And I And Bathroom Inventory Are Now Part Of Some Kind Of Matrix Of Poop Strongly Suggests That The Pulitzer Is Not What It Once Was.

During The Warm Season (august 8 And 9), Maine Is A True Vacation Paradise, Offering Visitors A Chance To Jump Into Crystal-clear Mountain Lakes And See If They Can Get Back Out Again Before Their Bodily Tissue Is Frozen As Solid As A Supermarket Turkey.

If It Weren't For Marriage, Men And Women Would Have To Fight With Total Strangers.

When I Heated My Home With Oil, I Used An Average Of 800 Gallons A Year. I Have Found That I Can Keep Comfortably Warm For An Entire Winter With Slightly Over Half That Quantity Of Beer.

Many People Have Trouble Sticking To Their Resolutions, And There Is A Simple Scientific Explanation For This. In 1987, A Team Of Psychologists Conducted A Study In Which They Monitored The New Year's Resolutions Of 275 People. After One Week The Psychologists Found That 92 Percent Of The People Were Keeping Their Resolutions; After Two Weeks We Have No Idea What Happened Because The Psychologists Had Quit Monitoring.

The Problem With Writing About Religion Is That You Run The Risk Of Offending Sincerely Religious People, And Then They Come After You With Machetes.

I Believe Many Harley Guys Spend More Time Revving Their Engines Than Actually Driving Anywhere; I Sometimes Wonder Why They Bother To Have Wheels On Their Motorcycles.

Once Again We Find Ourselves Enmeshed In The Holiday Season, That Very Special Time Of Year When We Join With Our Loved Ones In Sharing Centuries-old Traditions Such As Trying To Find A Parking Space At The Mall. We Traditionally Do This In My Family By Driving Around The Parking Lot Until We See A Shopper Emerge From The Mall, Then We Follow Her, In Very Much The Same Spirit As The Three Wise Men, Who 2,000 Years Ago Followed A Star, Week After Week, Until It Led Them To A Parking Space.

Don't You Wish You Had A Job Like Mine? All You Have To Do Is Think Up A Certain Number Of Words! Plus, You Can Repeat Words! And They Don't Even Have To Be True!

Hobbies Of Any Kind Are Boring Except To People Who Have The Same Hobby. This Is Also True Of Religion, Although You Will Not Find Me Saying So In Print.

Your Federal Government Needs Your Money So That It Can Perform Vital Services For You That You Would Not Think Up Yourself In A Million Years.

I Played Lead Guitar In A Band Called The Federal Duck, Which Is The Kind Of Name That Was Popular In The '60s As A Result Of Controlled Substances Being In Widespread Use. Back Then, There Were No Restrictions, In Terms Of Talent, On Who Could Make An Album, So We Made One, And It Sounds Like A Group Of People Who Have Been Given Powerful But Unfamiliar Instruments As A Therapy For A Degenerative Nerve Disease.

The Irs Spends God Knows How Much Of Your Tax Money On These Toll-free Information Hot Lines Staffed By Irs Employees, Whose Idea Of A Dynamite Tax Tip Is That You Should Print Neatly. If You Ask Them A Real Tax Question, Such As How You Can Cheat, They're Useless. So, For Guidance, You Want To Look To Big Business. Big Business Never Pays A Nickel In Taxes, According To Ralph Nader, Who Represents A Big Consumer Organization That Never Pays A Nickel In Taxes. . . .

This Is True; Virtually All Edible Substances, And Many Automotive Products, Are Now Marketed As Being Low-fat Or Fat-free. Americans Are Obsessed With Fat Content.

If You Were To Open Up A Baby's Head - And I Am Not For A Moment Suggesting That You Should - You Would Find Nothing But An Enormous Drool Gland.

I'm A Big Believer In Anesthesia. I Think It Should Be Used For Every Medical Procedure, Indlucing Routine Physicals.

Epcot Center Also Features Pavilions Built By Various Foreign Nations, Where You Can Experience An Extremely Realistic Simulation Of What Life In These Nations Would Be Like If They Consisted Almost Entirely Of Restaurants And Souvenir Stores.

Look, In Particular, At The People Who, Like You, Are Making Average Incomes For Doing Average Jobs- Bank Vice Presidents, Insurance Salesmen, Auditors, Secretaries Of Defense- And You'll Realie They All Dress The Same Way, Essentially The Way The Mannequins In The Sears Menswear Department Dress. Now Look At The Real Successes, The People Who Make A Lot More Money Than You- Elton John, Captain Kangaroo, Anybody From Saudi Arabia, Big Bird, And So On. They All Dress Funny- And They All Succeed.

...and Suddenly It Hits You: Human Skin Is Actually Made Up Of Billions Of Tiny Units Of Protoplasm, Called "cells"! And What Is Even More Interesting, The Ones On The Outside Are All Dying! This Is A Fact. Your Skin Is Like An Aggressive Modern Corporation, Where The Older Veteran Cells, Who Have Finally Worked Their Way To The Top And Obtained Offices With Nice Views,are Constantly Being Shoved Out The Window Head First, Without So Much As A Pension Plan,by Younger Hotshot Cells Moving Up From Below.

Here In Miami, On Weekends, Amusement-seekers Will Come To The Marina, Set Up Folding Chairs, And Spend A Highly Entertaining Day Watching Boat Owners Perform Comical Maneuvers Such As Forgetting To Set Their Parking Brakes And Having Their Cars Roll Down The Ramp And Disappear, Burbling Gaily, Below The Surface.

Directors Are Always Changing Things At The Last Minute. Actors Will Do A Scene, And The Director Will Say, ‘okay, That Was Perfect, But This Time, Bob, Instead Of Saying “what’s For Dinner?” You Say, “wait A Minute! Benzene Is Actually A Hydrocarbon!” And Say It With A Norwegian Accent. Also, We Think Maybe Your Character Should Have No Arms.

I Don't Have Any Insight Or Understanding On Anything About The Government. All I Think Is That It's Stupid - Which Is The One Perspective That's Almost Completely Lacking In Washington.

If God Had Wanted Us To Spend All Our Time Fretting About The Problems Of Home Ownership, He Would Never Have Created Beer. This Is Not To Say That I Am Recommending That You Totally Ignore Your Responsibilities As A Homeowner And Just Sit Around All Day With A Can Of Beer In Your Hand. No Indeed, I Have Long Been A Believer In Purchasing Bottled Beer, And Pouring It Into A Chilled Glass.

Granted, This System Is Insane, But We Must Not Let Sanity Stand In The Way Of Airport Security.

The Irs Wants You To Use This Form Because It Gets To Keep Most Of Your Money. So Unless You Have Pond Silt For Brains, You Want The Long Form.

For The Benefit Of Those Of You Who Have Real Jobs And Are Not Involved In The News Business, I Should First Explain That . . .

Think, For A Moment, Of The Countless Happy Childhood Hours You Spent With This Amazing Device: Drawing Perfect Horizontals, Drawing Perfect Verticals, Drawing Really Spastic Diagonals, Trying To Scrape Away The Silver Powder From The Window So You Could Look Inside.

You Should Not Use Your Fireplace, Because Scientists Now Believe That, Contrary To Popular Opinion, Fireplaces Actually Remove Heat From Houses. Really, That's What Scientists Believe. In Fact Many Scientists Actually Use Their Fireplaces To Cool Their Houses In The Summer. If You Visit A Scientist's House On A Sultry August Day, You'll Find A Cheerful Fire Roaring On The Hearth And The Scientist Sitting Nearby, Remarking On How Cool He Is And Drinking Heavily.

Every Year, Hundreds Of Thousands Of People Try Their Hand At This Demanding Profession (humor Columnist). After A Few Months, Almost All Of Them Have Given Up And Gone Back To The Ninth Grade.

Dear Hotel People: We Don't Need A Cheeseball Clock-radio. We Need Places To Plug Stuff In. Thank You.

Several Months Ago, Out Of The Blue, A Company Named "cingular" Started Sending Me Bills. I Had Never Heard Of Cingular, And I Honestly Did Not Know What These Bills Were For, So I Put Them In The Pile Where I Keep Documents That I Intend To Scrutinize More Carefully Later On, After My Death. Then I Started Seeing Tv Commercials For Cingular, But Of Course They Did Not Make It Clear What Cingular Is, Because The First Rule Of Modern Advertising Is: "never Reveal What You Are Advertising."

There Are Two Kinds Of Solar-heat Systems: Passive Systems Collect The Sunlight That Hits Your Home, And Active Systems Collect The Sunlight That Hits Your Neighbors' Homes, Too.

The Japanese Tend To Be Far More Co-operative And Docile And Group-oriented. It Would Be Easier To Get The Entire Population Of Tokyo To Wear Matching Outfits Than To Get Any Two Randomly Selected Americans To Agree On Pizza Toppings.

Spreadsheet: A Kind Of Program That Lets You Sit At Your Desk And Ask All Kinds Of Neat "what If?" Questions And Generate Thousands Of Numbers Instead Of Actually Working.

I Feel That Nasal Spray Is A Wondrous Medical Achievement, Because It Is Supposed To Relieve Nasal Congestion, And By Gadfrey, It Relieves Nasal Congestion. What I'm Saying Is That It Actually Works, Which Is Something You Can Say About Very Few Other Aspects Of The Medical Establishment.

Congress Shall Also Create A Tax Code Weighing More Than The Combined Poundage Of The Largest Member Of The House And The Largest Member Of The Senate, Plus A Standard Musk Ox.

The One Thing I'm Terrified Of Trying To Write About Is Sex. I Mean My God, My Wife Might Read It Or My Daughter Might Read It Or My Son Might Read It, So No, I've Never Really Written About Eroticism At All.

Without Question, The Greatest Invention In The History Of Mankind Is Beer. Oh, I Grant You That The Wheel Was Also A Fine Invention, But The Wheel Does Not Go Nearly As Well With Pizza.

But If I Hadn't Shoved You Off The Boat Back There,you'd Be Lost At Sea Now,wouldn't You? We'd All Be Lost! So Thanks To Me You're All Standing On Land." (pirates, Its A Good Thing They're Idiots)

Most American Homes Have Alternating Current, Which Means That The Electricty Goes In One Direction For A While, Then Goes In The Other Direction. This Prevents Harmful Electron Buildup In The Wires.

This Was Years Ago, I Think During The Early [ronald] Reagan Years. I Came Up With A Plan That Everybody Just Pay $8.95 In Taxes. Cheating Would Be Allowed. But The Incentive To Cheat Wouldn't Be Nearly As Great If You Only Had To Pay The $8.95. There Were A Few People Who Would Have To Pay Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars Under This Plan. I Think It Was Mark Goodson And Bill Todman, The Guys Who Do The Quiz Shows. But Almost Everybody Else Would Be Off Really Cheap.

No Matter What Happens, Somebody Will Find A Way To Take It Too Seriously.

When Your Super Bowl Guests Arrive, They Should Find A Mound Of Potato Chips Large Enough To Conceal A Pony Sitting In Front Of The Television. For Nutritional Balance, You Should Also Put Out A Bowl Of Carrot Sticks. If You Have No Carrot Sticks, You Can Use Pinecones, Or Used Electrical Fuses, Because Nobody Will Eat Them Anyway. This Is No Time For Nutritional Balance: This Is The Super Bowl, For God's Sake.

I Think Twitter Is Kind Of Fun, It's Not Deep And It Never Will Be, But It's A Great Way To Communicate One-liners And To Sort Of See What People Are Laughing About. It's A Terrific Source Of Misinformation.

Nevada Has A Very Dynamic Economy, With Gambling Being The Number-one Industry, Followed Closely By Blood Donorship.

Fishing Is Boring, Unless You Catch An Actual Fish, And Then It Is Disgusting.

After The War, Prohibition Was Passed, And With Liquor No Longer Legally Available The Nation Plunged Headlong Into The Great Depression.

If Mozart Had Power Tools, There's No Telling How Great His Music Might Have Been.

The Coyotes Made Too Much Noise Last Night And Kept Me Awake. Please Eradicate These Annoying Animals.

As Far As Outlining Is Concerned, I Don't Outline Humor. I Might Right Down A Word Or Two To Remind Myself Of A Punch Line I Thought Of, But The Actual Structure Of A Piece I Really Don't. I Don't Think It Would Really Help Me Because For Me The Process Is Joke, Joke, Joke, Joke.

People In The Computer Industry Use The Term 'user,' Which To Them Means 'idiot.'

Classical Music Gradually Lost Popularity Because It Is Too Complicated: You Need Twenty-five Or Thirty Skilled Musicians Just To Hum It Properly. So People Began To Develop Regular Music.

If, When You Talk To People, They Keep Backing Away From You, It's Because You're Too Close, Alright? So Don't Keep Advancing On Them Like A Human Glacier.

Never Try To Put All The Chemicals In The Entire World In Your Body At The Same Time.

If Women Were In Charge Of All The World's Nations, There Would Be Sincerely Believe This - No Military Conflicts, And When There Was A Military Conflict, Everybody Involved Would Feel Just Awful And There Would Soon Be A High-level Exchange Of Notes Written On Greeting Cards With Flowers On The Front, Followed By A Peace Luncheon

Shawn's (shawn Weatherly - Former Beauty Queen) Acting Ability Is Such That She Could Not Convey The Concept Of Falling If Your Pushed Her Off A Cliff.

Trails Need To Be Wider So People Can Walk While Holding Hands.

The Most Powerful Force In The Universe Is Gossip.

Of All The Wonderful Things Government Says, That's Always Been Just About My Favorite. As Opposed To If You Get To Keep The Money. Because What You'll Do Is Go Out And Bury It In Your Yard, Anything To Prevent That Money From Creating Jobs. They Never Stop Saying It.we Will Say, "this Is Expected To Create X Number Of Jobs." On The Other Hand, We Never Say That The Money We Removed From Another Part Of The Economy Will Kill Some Jobs.

I Liked Making People Laugh, And I Decided I Was An Atheist Early On. My Dad Was All Right With That. We Argued About It All The Time, But It Was Good-natured. He Was The Most Open-minded Human Being I've Ever Known.

What Gets Me Is, I Waited In Line For An Hour To Do This. I Could Have Experienced Essentially The Same Level Of Enjoyment Merely By Sticking My Finger Down My Throat.

Hardware: This Is The Part Of The Computer That Stops Working When You Spill Beer On It.

I'm Not Sure You Can Count As History, Was Keith Richards's "life," Which He So Modestly Titled It. I Did Find It A Fascinating Book. Keith's A Pretty Honest Fellow.

If You Want To Give A Man Something Practical, Consider Tires. More Than Once, I Would Have Gladly Traded All The Gifts I Got For A New Set Of Tires.

The Ford Falcon Holds The Proud Title Of Slowest Car Ever Built. In Certain Areas Of The Country You Can Go To A Stoplight And Find Falcon Drivers Who Pressed Down On Their Accelerators In 1963 And Are Still Waiting For Their Cars To Move.

San Francisco Leads The World In The Category Of Most People On The Sidewalk Holding Conversations With Purely Imaginary Companions.

Flying From The United States To Tokyo Takes Approximately As Long As Law School.

It Is A Well-documented Fact That Guys Will Not Ask For Directions. This Is A Biological Thing. This Is Why It Takes Several Million Sperm Cells... To Locate A Female Egg, Despite The Fact That The Egg Is, Relative To Them, The Size Of Wisconsin.

I Can Win An Argument On Any Topic, Against Any Opponent. People Know This, And Steer Clear Of Me At Parties. Often, As A Sign Of Their Great Respect, They Don't Even Invite Me.

Funny Inspirational

By Today's Beauty Standards, Of Course, Marilyn Monroe Was An Oil Tanker.

I Know That All Over America There's Probably Politicians Sending Out Pictures Of Themselves Signing That Mandatory Helmet Bill, But It's Bullshit. I Say That As A Parent.

Your Digestive System Is Your Body's Fun House, Whereby Food Goes On A Long, Dark, Scary Ride, Taking All Kinds Of Unexpected Twists And Turns, Being Attacked By Vicious Secretions Along The Way, And Not Knowing Until The Last Minute Whether It Will Be Turned Into A Useful Body Part Or Ejected Into The Dark Hole By Mister Sphincter.

Newspaper Readership Is Declining Like Crazy. In Fact, There's A Good Chance That Nobody Is Reading My Column.

This Year, U.s. Airlineswill Carry A Record 143 Million Passengers, Who Will Be In The Air For 382 Million Hours, During Which They Will Be Fed An Estimated Total Of Four Peanuts.

When I Write My Annual Tax Column, Some Ex-irs Agent Will Complain, "there You Go Irs Bashing Again." They're Always Saying That They're Just Doing Their Job. Someone I Know Once Said, "you Could Get Another Job."

The Spanish Government, Having Run Completely Out Of Money, Secretly Sold The Pyrenees To China, And Is Now Separated From France Only By Traffic Cones.

Maybe Somebody Finally Shot The Dog.

Thanks To My Solid Academic Training, Today I Can Write Hundreds Of Words On Virtually Any Topic Without Possessing A Shred Of Information Which Is How I Got A Good Job In Journalism.

U.s. News Organizations Observe The Anniversary Of September 11 With Investigations About The Nation's Continuing Vulnerability To Terrorism. First, The New York Daily News Reports That Two Of Its Reporters Carried Box Cutters, Razor Kinves, And Pepper Spray On Fourteen Commerical Flights Without Getting Caught. Then Abc News Reports That It Smuggled Fifteen Pounds Of Uranium Into New York City. Then Fox News Reports That It Flew Osama Bin Laden To Washington, D.c., And Videotaped Him Touring The White House.

I Have Never Had A Point In My Life To Make. I'm Just Trying To Entertain The Reader.

When The Boomers Started To Have Kids Reach Adolescence, There Was Suddenly This Feeling That They Needed To Protect Their Kids From All The Same Things They Did When They Were Kids. Which I Guess Is A Natural Tendency, But It Makes For A Less Fun Society.

I Do Not Mean To Be The Slightest Bit Critical Of Tv Newspeople, Who Do A Superb Job, Considering That They Operate Under Severe Time Constraints And Have The Intellectual Depth Of Hamsters. But Tv News Can Only Present The "bare Bones" Of A Story; It Takes A Newspaper, With Its Capability To Present Vast Amounts Of Information, To Render The Story Truly Boring.

Denmark (also Called Norway) Is Best Known As The Original Home Of The Prune Danish As Well As The Vikings, Who Wore Hats With Horns Sticking Out Of Them, And For A Very Good Reason: They Were Insane.

I, Alone, Could Never Have Produced This Book. I Say This Mainly In Case There Are Lawsuits.

The Japanese Eat, Sleep, And Breathe Golf; The Only Thing They Don't Do Is Actually Play It, Because To Get On A Course, You Have To Make A Reservation Roughly 137 Years In Advance, Which Means That By The Time You Actually Get To The First Tee You Are Deceased. Of Course, In Golf This Is Not Really A Handicap.

Millions Of Americans Own Dogs, Because They Are Good-natured, Simple, And Easily Amused. I Am Referring Here To The Americans. The Dogs Are Not Exactly Mensa Members Either, But They Definitely Make Better Pets Than Tropical Fish.

See, When The Government Spends Money, It Creates Jobs; Whereas When The Money Is Left In The Hands Of Taxpayers, God Only Knows What They Do With It. Bake It Into Pies, Probably. Anything To Avoid Creating Jobs.

I Had No Shoes And I Pitied Myself. Then I Met A Man Who Had No Feet, So I Took His Shoes.

Dogs Love To Go For Rides. A Dog Will Happily Get Into Any Vehicle Going Anywhere.

Until I Became A Parent, I Thought Children Just Naturally Knew How To Catch A Ball, That Catching Was An Instinctive Biological Reflex That All Children Are Born With, Like Knowing How To Operate A Remote Control Or Getting High Fevers In Distant Airports.

We Have Always Had Dogs, And They Have Faithfully Performed Many Valuable Services For Us, Such As: 1. Peeing On Everything. 2. When We're Driving In Our Car, Alerting Us That We Have Passed Another Dog By Barking Real Loud In Our Ears For The Next 114 Miles. 3. Trying To Kill The Avon Lady.

Funny, Isn't It? The Airlines Go To All That Trouble To Keep You From Taking A Gun On Board, Then They Just Hand You A Dinner Roll You Could Kill A Musk Ox With.

The Doctor Looked At My Cardiogram And Made That "hmmmm" Noise That Doctors Are Taught In Medical School So They Won't Come Right Out And Say "uh-oh!"

There Are Also A Number Of Humans Living Up There (canada), And In Many Ways They Have A Lifestyle Quite Similar To Ours, Including Such Traditional American Activities As Driving Japanese Cars.

My Mother Told Me, “son, It Is Better To Be Rich And Healthy Than Poor And Sick.” I Have Tried Very Hard To Heed Those Words.

Lobsters Displays All Three Of The Classic Biological Characteristics Of An Insect, Namely: 1. It Has Way More Legs Than Necessary. 2. There Is No Way You Would Ever Pet It. 3. It Does Not Respond To Simple Commands Such As "here, Boy!"

The Internet "browser"... Is The Piece Of Software That Puts A Message On Your Computer Screen Informing You That The Internet Is Currently Busy And You Should Try Again Later.

Meetings Are An Addictive, Highly Self-indulgent Activity That Corporations And Other Large Organizations Habitually Engage In Only Because They Cannot Actually Masturbate.

Univac: A Device, Which Contained 20,000 Vacuum Tubes, Occupied 1,500 Square Feet And Weighed 40 Tons; There Was Also A Laptop Version Weighing 27 Tons.

A Sense Of Humor Is A Measurement Of The Extent To Which We Realize That We Are Trapped In A World Almost Totally Devoid Of Reason. Laughter Is How We Express The Anxiety We Feel At This Knowledge.

You Know How On The Evening News They Always Tell You That The Stock Market Is Up In Active Trading, Or Off In Moderate Trading, Or Trading In Mixed Activity, Or Whatever. Well, Who Gives A

Never Board A Commercial Aircraft If The Pilot Is Wearing A Tank Top.

Take The Folks At Coca-cola. For Many Years, They Were Content To Sit Back And Make The Same Old Carbonated Beverage. It Was A Good Beverage, No Question About It; Generations Of People Had Grown Up Drinking It And Doing The Experiment In Sixth Grade Where You Put A Nail Into A Glass Of Coke And After A Couple Of Days The Nail Dissolves And The Teacher Says: Imagine What It Does To Your Teeth! So Coca-cola Was Solidly Entrenched In The Market, And The Management Saw No Need To Improve.

Congress Is Thinking About Eliminating A Federal Program Under Which Scientists Broadcast Signals To Alien Beings. This Would Be A Large Mistake. Alien Beings Have Atomic Blaster Death Cannons. You Cannot Cut Off Their Federal Programs As If They Were Merely Poor People.

It May Be Meaningless, But At Least It's A Gesture.

Are We Ever Going To Have A Federal Tax System That Regular People Can Understand?

My Theory Is That There Is A Finite Amount Of Intelligence In A Family, And You're Supposed To Gradually Transfer It To Your Children Over A Period Of Many Years. This Is Why Your Parents Started To Get So Stupid Just At The Time In Your Life When You Were Getting Really Smart.

Reporters Aren't Stupid. We Were Standing Around Talking About Which Of The 900 Health-care Proposals That Nobody's Going To Accept Is That Day's Hot News. They Know How Silly That Is. But That's What They Do.

The Information Encoded In Your Dna Determines Your Unique Biological Characteristics, Such As Sex, Eye Color, Age And Social Security Number.

Today's Beauty Ideal, Strictly Enforced By The Media, Is A Person With The Same Level Of Body Fat As A Paper Clip.

Take Out The Fortune Before You Eat The Cookie.

Professional Marriage Counselors Agree That The Most Productive And Mature Way To Deal With Marital Anger Is To Stomp Dramatically From The Room. You Want To Make Your Move Before The Opponent Does, Because The First Person To Stomp From The Room Receives Valuable Argument Points That Can Be Redeemed For Exciting Merchandise At The Marital Prize Redemption Center.

Trending Author

Harold MacMillan

Kamla Persad-Bissessar

Nadia Boulanger

Penelope Fitzgerald

Category