HUMOR

[Friday]

[note: Australians and New Zealanders like to dis each other]

A Kiwi ventriloquist visiting Australia walks into a small village and sees a local sitting on his veranda patting his dog.

He figures he'll have a little fun, so he says to the local, "G'day, mind if I talk to your  dog?"

Villager: "The  dog doesn't talk, you stupid Kiwi."

Ventriloquist:  "Hello dog, how's it going, mate?"

Dog:  "Yeah, doin' all right."

Aussie (look of extreme shock)

Ventriloquist:  "Is this villager your owner?" (pointing at the villager)

Dog: "Yep."

Ventriloquist:  "How does he treat you?"

Dog: "Yeah, real good. He walks me twice a day, feeds me great food, and takes me to the lake now and again to play."

Aussie: (look  of utter disbelief)

Ventriloquist:  "Mind if I talk to your horse?"

Aussie: "Uh, the horse doesn't talk either... I think."

Ventriloquist:  "Hey horse, how's it going?"

Horse: "Cool."

Aussie: (absolutely dumbfounded)

Ventriloquist: "Is this your owner?" (Pointing at the villager)

Horse: "Yep."

Ventriloquist:  "How does he treat you?"

Horse: "Pretty good, thanks for asking. He rides me regularly, brushes me down often, and keeps me in the shed to protect me from the elements."

Aussie: (total look of amazement)

Ventriloquist: "Mind if I talk to your sheep?"

Aussie (in a panic): "The sheep's a compulsive liar."

[MTPorcupine3]

On a Saturday afternoon, in Washington , D. C., an aide to House Speaker  Nancy Pelosi visited the Bishop of the Catholic cathedral in  D.C.

He told the Cardinal that Nancy Pelosi would be attending the next day's Mass, and he asked if the Cardinal would kindly point out
Pelosi to the congregation and say a few words that would include calling Pelosi a saint.

The Cardinal replied, "No. I don't really like the woman, and there are issues of conflict with the Catholic Church over certain of Pelosi's views."

Pelosi's aide then said, "Look. I'll write a check here and now for a donation of $100,000 to your church if you'll just tell the congregation you see Pelosi as a saint."

The Cardinal thought about it and said, "Well, the church can use the money, so I'll work your request into tomorrow's
sermon."

As Pelosi's aide promised, House Speaker Pelosi appeared for the Sunday worship and seated herself prominently at the forward left side of the center aisle.

As promised, at the start of his sermon, the Cardinal pointed out that Speaker Pelosi was present.

The Cardinal went on to explain to the congregation, "While Speaker Pelosi's presence is probably an honor to some, the woman is not numbered among my personal favorite personages.

Some of her most egregious views are contrary to tenets of the Church, and she tends to flip-flop on many other issues.

Nancy Pelosi is a petty, self-absorbed hypocrite, a thumb sucker, and a nit-wit.

Nancy Pelosi is also
a serial liar, a cheat, and a thief.

I must say, Nancy Pelosi is the worst example of a Catholic I have ever personally witnessed.

She married for money and is using her wealth to lie to the American people.

She also has a reputation for shirking her Representative obligations both in Washington , and in California .

The  woman is simply not to be trusted."

The Cardinal
concluded, "But, when compared with Obama and Senators Harry Reid and John Kerry, House Speaker Pelosi is a saint."

[John]

I haven't taken the time to catch up on this tread in WAY too long ....

Just thought I'd jump in to give early warning (to the HUMOR thread crowd) that I'm considering having an Open Mike Comedy Night at the Peaceful Assembly Church (860 Main St., Grafton).
It might not happen for a while but - You've now been warned. 

[DavidForthoffer]

Three vampires walk into a bar.

The first one says, "I'm thirsty. Give me a pint of blood."

The second one says, "I'm thirsty, too. Give me a pint of blood."

The third one says, "I'm thirsty, too, but I'm on a diet. Give me a pint of plasma."

The bartender turns to his assistant and yells, "Two Bloods and a Blood Light!"

[41mag]

Ran across this a while back.  Found it funny, not sure if it's true though.

---------------------

The U.S. standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an
exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used? Because that's the way they built them in England,
and English expatriates built the U.S. Railroads. ( although I seem to remember in my history class
something about competing gauges used by different companies to prevent other companies from
connecting to their lines)

Why did the English build them like that? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people
who built  the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used. Why did "they" use that gauge
then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that used for building
wagons, which used that wheel spacing.

Okay! Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Well, if they tried to use any
other spacing, the wagon wheels would break some of the old, long distance roads! In England,
because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts. So who built those old rutted roads? Imperial Rome
built the first long distance roads in Europe (and England) for their legions. The roads have been
used ever since.

And the ruts in the roads? Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to
match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome,
they were all alike in  the matter of wheel spacing.

Therefore, the United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the
original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot.

And bureaucracies live forever. So the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what
horse's ass came up with it, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial Roman war chariots were
made just wide  enough to accommodate the back ends of two war horses.

Now here's the twist to this story:

When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached
to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by
Thiokol at their factory at Utah. The engineers who designed the SRBs would have preferred to make
them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site.

The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The SRB's had
to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad
track, as you now  know, is about as wide as two horses' behinds. So, a major Space Shuttle design
feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two
thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass....

And you thought being a HORSE'S ASS wasn't important?

[Pat McCotter]

Ran across this a while back.  Found it funny, not sure if it's true though.

Yep, it's a good read but nope, not true.
http://www.snopes.com/history/american/gauge.asp

[Lloyd Danforth]

Way to ruin a good story, Pat?

[Pat McCotter]

 

[Russell Kanning]

it still could be a lot wider though
i guess the germans tried to build 2 parallel lines in places to move really big guns
it didn't work out very well

[FreelanceFreedomFighter]

(heard this one recently... thought I'd share...)

An old prospector shuffled into town leading an old tired mule.

The old man headed straight for the only saloon to clear his parched throat.

He walked up and tied his old mule to the hitch rail. As he stood there, brushing some of the dust from his face and clothes, a young gunslinger stepped out of the saloon with a gun in one hand and a bottle of whiskey in the other.

The young gunslinger looked at the old man and laughed, saying, "Hey old man, have you ever danced?"

The old man looked up at the gunslinger and said, "No, I never did dance... never really wanted to."

A crowd had gathered as the gunslinger grinned and said, "Well, you old fool, you're gonna dance now," and started shooting at the old man's feet.

The old prospector --not wanting to get a toe blown off-- started hopping around like a flea on a hot skillet. Everybody was laughing, fit to be tied.

When his last bullet had been fired, the young gunslinger, still laughing, holstered his gun and turned around to go back into the saloon.

The old man turned to his pack mule, pulled out a double-barreled shotgun, and cocked both hammers.

The loud clicks carried clearly through the desert air.

The crowd stopped laughing immediately.

The young gunslinger heard the sounds too, and he turned around very slowly. The silence was almost deafening.

The crowd watched as the young gunman stared at the old timer and the large gaping holes of those twin barrels.

The barrels of the shotgun never wavered in the old man's hands, as he quietly said, "Son, have you ever licked a mule's ass?"

The gunslinger swallowed hard and said, "No sir..... but... I've always wanted to."

There are a few lessons for us all here:

Never be arrogant.
Don't waste ammunition.
Whiskey makes you think you're smarter than you are.
Always, always make sure you know who has the power.
Don't mess with old men, they didn't get old by being stupid.

[FreelanceFreedomFighter]

On railroads:

One historical reason why the CSA lost that little conflict about 150 years ago was because they were very "free market" oriented and allowed the three different major railroads in the South to run with different gages. That meant that in order to get supplies from point A to point B, it sometimes took unloading and reloading them from one carrier to another. While in the USA all gages were required by the government to be the same size which allowed the freight cars to simply be uncoupled from one carrier and recoupled to a different carrier.

At least that's what I was told in a history class years and years ago...

YMMV...

[KBCraig]

Ran across this a while back.  Found it funny, not sure if it's true though.

Yep, it's a good read but nope, not true.
http://www.snopes.com/history/american/gauge.asp

It is true, though, that Stephen Monier's ass is 4 feet 8.5 inches wide.

[Mike Barskey]

"Fear the Boom and Bust" a Hayek vs. Keynes Rap Anthem

"Fear the Boom and Bust" a Hayek vs. Keynes Rap Anthem

I hope MengerFan sees this.

[Jim Johnson]

"Hedgehogs - why can't they just share the hedge?"

[Pat McCotter]

Two Lessons

A lawyer boarded an airplane in New Orleans with a box of frozen crabs and asked a blonde stewardess to take care of them for him. She took the box and promised to put it in the crew's refrigerator.

He advised her that he was holding her personally responsible for them staying frozen, mentioning in a very haughty manner that he was a lawyer and proceeded to rant at her about what would happen if she let them thaw out.

Needless to say, she was annoyed by his behavior.

Shortly before landing in New York, she used the intercom to announce to the entire cabin, "Would the lawyer who gave me the crabs in New Orleans, please raise your hand?"

Not one hand went up so she took them home and ate them.

The two lessons here are:

1. Lawyers aren't as smart as they think they are.

2. Blondes aren't as dumb as most folk think.