The Wabe → Rob's Mini-Oracularities Page → Rob's Mini-Oracularities Page: Questions 80-89
(Question-06 Jun 1998)
The question was:
> In the battle of the sexes, who is winning?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} The lawyers.
(Question-22 Jul 1998)
The question was:
> Oracle, please sing me a song about Alviso, the Mud-filled Marina.
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} In Sunnyvale did Moffett Field
} A stately Air Force base decree
} Where Stevens creek, the sacred river ran
} Through mud-flats measureless to man
} Down to the sunless sea.
}
} You owe the Oracle a cubic foot of "Dumbarton Snow".
(Answer-25 Jul 1998)
The question was:
> I asked the post office to forward my email after I moved, but they said
> they wouldn't. It's outrageous! What makes them think they can get
> away with this ridiculous behavior?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} It's not that they *wouldn't*, it's that they *couldn't*, and it's all
} your fault. You forgot to bring Form 113837591757-xd, Request to Forward
} Electronic Messages over USENET.
}
} Fortunately, I happen to have a stack here (just in case those pesky
} FBI agents are able to reconstruct the evidence). Here you go...
}
} ------------------------------------------------------------------------
}
} Form 113837591757-xd
} Request to Forward Electronic Messages over USENET
}
} 1) Name (Last, First, MI): ____________________________________________
} 2) Current E-Mail address: ____________________________________________
} 3) New E-mail address (All styles required for proper processing)
} 3a) Internet form: _________________________________________________
} 3b) UUCP form: _____________________________________________________
} 3c) BITnet form: ___________________________________________________
} 3d) DECnet form: ___________________________________________________
} 3e) FIDOnet form: __________________________________________________
}
} 4) Are you directly connected to the Internet? Y/N
} 4a) If "No," why the hell not? _____________________________________
}
} 5) Do you plan to read the forwarded mail on a machine running a
} Microsoft operating system? Y/N
} 5a) If "Yes," are you willing to admit that to others? Y/N
} 5a1) If "Yes," are you actually *proud* of that fact? Y/N
} 5a1a) If "Yes," do not complete this form. Call
} 1-800-555-7726 and report yourself immediately.
} Special agents will arrive at your home quickly and
} administer a severe beating.
} 5b) If "No," are you willing to jump on the bandwagon and come to
} Washington, D.C. to testify in front of the Senate that Bill Gates
} sucks the bone marrow out of sacrificed infants? Y/N
}
} 6) Do you plan to send messages that use HTML in the body, knowing
} full well that not everybody on the planet is stupid enough to use
} Netscape as a mail reader? Y/N
}
} 7) Do you plan to send "Virtual Greeting Cards," even though they
} make you appear to be the Cheapest Bastard on Earth?
}
} 8) Do you:
} 8a) send SPAM mail?
} 8b) naively reply to SPAM with "REMOVE" as the subject?
} 8c) send a complaint to the Postmaster on the machine mentioned in
} the "From" line?
} 8d) spend your entire lunch hour analyzing the 'Received' header
} lines, carefully backtracking until you are able to nail the
} asshole to the wall?
}
} 9) Do you automatically destroy mail from:
} 9a) Hotmail?
} 9b) Juno?
} 9c) Bigfoot?
} 9d) AOL?
} 9e) Netcom?
} 9f) anyone who sends mail with the subject "Make Money Fast"?
} 9g) the Usenet Oracle?
} 9h) the Internet Oracle?
} 9i) anyone sending an Oracle question mentioning "Zadoc"?
}
} (SPECIAL INSTRUCTIONS IF ANY OF THE ABOVE DESCRIBE YOU: Do not
} complete this form. Call 1-800-555-7726 and report yourself
} immediately. Special agents will arrive at your home quickly and
} administer a severe beating.)
}
} 10) Do you use the Internet to download pornography? Y/Y
} 10a) Please list the sites here: ___________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
} _______________________________________________________________
}
} 11) Have you ever as a system administrator at a large California
} university become so infuriated with people playing XTrek that you
} routed all the packets between your cluster and the server through a
} machine in Sweden? Y/N
} 11a) Would you do it again in a heartbeat? Y/N
} 11b) Do you want to work for us? Y/N
}
} 12) Do you eat and drink at the keyboard, knowing full well that a
} slip will make the keyboard so gooey that if you ever hit the
} 'zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz' key it will stick until you lift the keyboard a
} foot off the table and drop it? Y/N
}
} 13) Have you ever been sexually assaulted by the President of the
} United States? Y/N
}
} 14) After spending this amount of time filling out this form, do you
} suddenly have a longing for the "good ol' days" when sending mail
} meant sitting down at a desk and putting pen to paper? Do you
} long for the taste of mucilage? Do you wistfully sigh when you
} open your mailbox and only find ads from the drug store? Y/N
}
} I HEREBY STATE UNDER PENALTY OF PERJURY THAT ALL THE INFORMATION ON
} THIS DOCUMENT IS CORRECT.
} Signed _________________________
} Date _________________________
}
} ------------------------------------------------------------------------
(Answer-04 Aug 1998)
The question was:
> Oh most cool one, what do you drive?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} About 240 yards, on my better days. That is, of course, with no wind.
}
} You owe the Oracle a new set of golf clubs.
(Answer-21 Sep 1998)
The question was:
> O Oracle most oracular, who is the most oraclacaceous being there be, whose
> oraculacity is beyond puny human ken,
>
> After years of observing squirrels, I have noticed that they have an uncanny
> resemblence to each other. I believe that there are only in fact two squirrels
> on earth. Is this true? And how have they managed to pull off this illusion
> so well?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Close, supplicant, close. It is a strong possibility that there is
} only ONE squirrel in the universe. How can I say that, seeing that
} there are numerous eyewitness reports of large congregations of
} squirrels in parks? Quite simple, actually: according to the theory,
} gray squirrels are simply brown squirrels going BACKWARDS IN TIME.
}
} THE SINGLE SQUIRREL THEORY
}
} Naturalists have long reported two unique phenomena dealing with
} brown/gray squirrel interaction. The first happens when a gray
} squirrel collides with a brown squirrel: they disappear and emit a
} nutron (NUT-ron) particle. This is known as "annihilation." The
} other happens when a nutron suddenly becomes a brown/gray squirrel
} combination. This is known as "pair production." Traditionally, the
} gray squirrel is known as the antisquirrel because it appears less
} frequently than its brown counterpart.
}
} The Single Squirrel Theory (SST) says that these collisions are not
} creating and destroying squirrels, but simply changing their
} chronological momentum. Take a look at the following diagram, of
} actual squirrel activity along a sidewalk in Central Park, New York
} City:
}
} ^ N N
} | N \ |
} T / A A N = nutron
} I A / \ |\ B = brown squirrel
} M / \ / G B G G = gray squirrel
} E B G B \| \ A = annihilation event
} | / \ / P \ P = pair-production event
} / P / \
} / | N \
} / N \
}
} <--- SIDEWALK --->
}
} (Forgive the crudity of the drawing, time-space diagrams are difficult
} in ASCII.) In our time frame, it appears that two pair-production
} events generate two gray/brown squirrel pairs, which are annihilated
} moments later, some through interactions of browns and grays already
} on the sidewalk.
}
} But if we take a static time-space view, we can visualize a completely
} different process. One can follow an unbroken path, going forward (up)
} with brown squirrels, and backward (down) with gray squirrels.
} Annihilations are simply the conversion of a brown to a gray (with the
} nutron carrying the forward time momentum away) and pair-productions
} are the reverse effect (with the nutron leaving the event in reverse
} time).
}
} The SST is our best theory yet for dealing with the exotica of Quantum
} Furrydynamics, but there are still some bugs to be worked out. For
} instance, how do squirrel quarks (e.g., roadkill) fit into the theory?
} What about strong evidence for the existence of proto-squirrels? It
} is my hope, that with lots of government funding, I can solve these
} problems.
}
} You owe the Oracle a government grant and a supercollider.
(Answer-24 Sep 1998)
The question was:
> PINKY: So what are we doing here?
>
> BRAIN: I've told you! We're filling in for the Usenet Oracle for a
> week, so he can go on vacation.
>
> PINKY: Erm, OK. But what do *you* get out of it, Brain?
>
>
> ______________________________________________________
> Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} BRAIN: See that logo annoying splashed on the bottom of our mail
} message? It means we are using HotMail, a recognized leader in the
} generation of unsolicited commericial missives.
}
} PINKY: Oh, you mean SPAM! Poit! Narf! Spam, spam, loverly spam...
}
} <BOP!>
}
} BRAIN: That's enough of that. Now, I've compiled a list of the most
} irritating features of an unsol... er, spam message, and combined them
} into the most irritating message of all... the ultimate spam!
}
} PINKY: Naaaaaaaaaaaarf!
}
} BRAIN: Yes, ahem, narf. Then we'll...
}
} PINKY: No, no, let me, let me! We'll spam them and suggest they join
} the Narf of the Day mailing list! They'll laugh so hard that they'll
} fall off their chairs and twist their ankles! Then, when they're all
} in the hospital...
}
} <BOP!>
}
} BRAIN: YOU'LL be in the hospital if you keep this up. And don't ever
} mention that Narf of the Day mailing list again! How can anyone find
} any humor in... never mind. This is the plan: We'll send out a
} message so annoying, so offensive, so utterly obnoxious that people
} WON'T be able to throw it away. They'll try to respond to it, they'll
} try to dissect it, they'll forward it to abuse complaint lines and
} postmasters all over the globe, effectively paralyzing the global
} information infrastructure for hours, in which time we'll TAKE OVER
} THE WORLD!
}
} PINKY: Amazing, Brain! Stupendous, uh, oh, no, wait... How are we
} going to get that message to so many people? Isn't there a limit on
} how many recipients you can send a message to?
}
} BRAIN: Yes, there is. However, we are-- that is, I am-- going to use
} one of the numerous security holes in Windows NT to break in and
} remove that restriction.
}
} PINKY: But Brain, ...
}
} BRAIN: Quiet, Pinky! Give me a hand with the door to the server vault.
}
} PINKY: But Brain, ...
}
} BRAIN: I said quiet, Pinky!
}
} <CREEEEEEEK!>
}
} BRAIN: Excellent! Now, hand me the floppy... What is this!?!
}
} PINKY: It's what I've been trying to tell you, Brain. They couldn't
} get Windows NT to handle all the mail messages going through HotMail,
} so they had to use Solaris. It was covered in the Narf of the... uh,
} you know.
}
} BRAIN: This is so... so annoying! My perfect plan for world
} domination, fouled by the limitations of Windows NT!
}
} PINKY: I think Bill Gates has the exact same feeling.
}
} BRAIN: Close the door, Pinky. We need to go back to the lab, to get
} ready for tomorrow night.
}
} PINKY: Why, Brain? What are we doing tomorrow night? Hacking into
} Juno?
}
} <BOP!>
}
} BRAIN: No, Pinky, it's the same thing we do EVERY night... Try to take
} over the Internet!
}
} You owe the Oracle a subscription to the Narf of the Day mailing list.
(Answer-14 Apr 1999)
The question was:
> Of course, you realize this means war!!
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} OK, let's do it!
}
} +---+ +---+
} | | | |
} | 7 | | 7 |
} | +-----+ +-----+ |
} +--| @@@+---+ +---+@@@ |--+
} +----| | | |----+
} | J | | 8 |
} | | | |
} +---+ +---+
}
} I win! And look, I got one of your aces! You're toast now, monkey
} boy!
}
} You owe the Oracle a better way of killing a rainy afternoon.
(Answer-05 Jan 2000)
The question was:
> Oracle most measureless and cherished, > > Are there still dwarves mining the depths below our feet?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Dwarves underneath our feet, mining away? Preposterous. } } Although.... it *has* been a while since I've checked my mines. I mean, } there's a steady stream of gold from the Lost Indiana lode (one of the } best kept secrets in this country, BTW), so I really don't need to keep } tabs on the lot... } } Come along, supplicant. I shall give you the tour of the mine. Watch } your step there... it's a bit rough here... heads up! oh, sorry, should } have given you this hardhat earlier... careful, that shaft looks ready } to collapse... need to replace these timbers one of these days... oh, } look, quartz! I'll add this to my rock collection... yes, it is a bit } stuffy, one of the circulating fans must be off-line... and here we are! } } Let's ask this fellow about dwarves... You, good man! } } "Yes?" } } Do you know anything about... wait a minute, you look familiar. } } "No I don't. Trick of the light. You have dust in your eyes!" } } Wait, now I recognize you! You're Michael Dukakis! } } "*sigh* Yes, you caught me." } } But what are you doing here, down in my mine? } } "After failing so miserably in 1988, I decided to go into hiding rather } than be ridiculed for the rest of my life. It's not Palm Springs, but } I get three squares a day and there's no chance of 'Spy' magazine } finding me here." } } Anyone else of note? } } "Well, the fella over there doing the pie chart of mineral yields is } Ross Perot..." } } Well, thank you for your time. } } I guess you were right, supplicant. There are dwarves still mining } beneath our feet... if not in stature, in character. } } You owe the Oracle a replacement "Bill 'n' Opus-- Why Not the Worst?" } bumper sticker.
(Answer-09 Jan 2000)
The question was:
> Oracle, you are more musical than Apollo, more muscular than > Hephaestus, stronger than Heracles, longer than--Hades, I don't have > to spout this dreck--you and I were in grade school together. > > Anyway, I have this problem. On a whim, I got a permanent. Boy, was > that a mistake. I wanted body and bounce, but my snakes became limp > and lifeless. I figure that, if you can't help me, then Lisa can. > Any ideas? > > Love and kisses to you both, > > The Gorgon Stheno
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Long time no see. Isn't it a wonder how the Internet gets old friends } back in contact? } } Anyway, I'm not sure how to answer your question as I've never had to } deal with a limp snake. Nope, never, not me. But if I were you I'd } go over to Dionysus's place and ask his son Priapus for some advice. } If there's anyone who would know how to add bounce to a lifeless snake } he'd be the one. } } You owe the Oracle some Viagra. Er, it's for a friend. Really.
(Answer-12 Jun 2000)
The question was:
> Wise Oracle, > > Why doesn't the USA buy Baja California?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} July, 2000: Mexico's foolish investment into "dot-coms" surfaces. } Peso crashes. } } August, 2000: US agrees to buy Baja California for $12 billion. } } October, 2000: Deal finalized. Baja California is annexed onto } California. } } January, 2001: Los Angeles, always so appearance-conscious, complains } that the newly annexed territory makes state look } "lame." } } March, 2001: Emergency measure passed to create 51st state from the } region previously known as Baja California. New } states will follow prior convention and be known as } North and South California. } } March, 2001: San Francisco claims that "Northern California" has } always been associated with class and sophistication, } so Los Angeles shouldn't be allowed into the new North } California. } } April, 2001: Los Angeles says "that uppity city of fruits" has no } right claiming they lack class. } } June, 2001: In a surprise move, Fresno claims "it is sick of BOTH } those losers" and wants its own state. } } August, 2001: NBC news reveals secret tapes showing the mayors of } Sacramento, Bakersfield, and Fresno planning a } secession from the state of North California. } } November, 2001: San Diego, sick and tired of the whole thing, applies } for political amnesty in Mexico. Says the mayor: } "It's not like anyone would notice, right?" } } February, 2002: Talks break down. Los Angeles and San Francisco agree } to form a loose alliance against the Inland Empire. } } March, 2003: The US attempts to sell the Californias back to Mexico } after it is discovered that they invested the entire } Federal Budget in "Pokemon: The Second Movie." } } April, 2003: Mexico refutes the offer, with a snicker and the } comment "You wanted it; well, now you got it." } } May, 2003: The LAPD invades Bakersfield. } } June, 2003: In retaliation, 400,000 tons of raisins fall on } downtown San Francisco, paralyzing the city. San } Francisco responds with "Rice-a-roni" bombs. } } July, 2003: WHERE IN HELL DID FRESNO GET NUKES?!? } } August, 2003: The area previously known as Baja California is now } officially renamed "California." The area previously } known as California is now called "the radioactive } wasteland formerly known as California." } } You owe the Oracle a box of raisins, a ride on a cable car, and the } destruction of Kevin Costner's next post-apocalyptic movie before it } hits the theaters.
Last Modified: 2003/12/08 23:59:10 GMT
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