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WITandWISDOM(tm) - August 3, 1999 ~~~~~~~ THOUGHTS: "The greatest weakness of most humans is their hesitancy to tell others how much they love them while they're still alive." - O. A. Battista (E- zine: DAILY BITS http://www.DailyBits.com) ~~~~~~~ SPECIAL THOUGHTS: ~~~~~~~ THIS & THAT: A father wanted to illustrate to his son the difference between "anger" and "exasperation." He looked up the phone number of a pompous fellow commuter whom he knew only by name and reputation, and he dialed the number. When the call was answered by the man, the father asked, "Is Adolph there?" "There's no Adolph here. Why don't you get the right number before bothering people this hour of the night?" roared the man on the other end. "Now that," said the father when he put down the phone, "was simply annoyance. We'll wait a few minutes, and then you'll hear something." After a decent interval, the father dialed the some number and again asked, "Is Adolph there?' This time the other party literally screamed into the phone, "What's the matter with you, are you crazy? I told you to look up the number and stop bothering me!" Whereupon the receiver at the other end was slammed down. "Now that fellow was angry," said the father. "In a few minutes I will show you what I mean by exasperation compared to anger." After 15 minutes or so, the father dialed the same number for the third time, and when the same man answered at the other end, the father said almost cheerily, "Hello, this is Adolph. Have there been any messages for me during the past half hour or so?" - Ralph L. Woods, The Modern Handbook of Humor, McGraw-Hill - Bits & Pieces, June 22, 1995 (Magazine: BITS & PIECES http://www.epinc.com/ ) ~~~~~~~ KEEP SMILING: I was sitting in a class where my friend (a new 29 year old prof) was being evaluated as to whether he got to keep his job beyond the initial year. The classroom was packed with other senior profs and students. Jean presented a lecture on South America. At one point he said, "Latin American countries were in dire economic straits, were on the verge of bankruptcy and faced a grim economic future - what did they do? " The student beside me shouted out, "THEY GRADUATED!" :) The class erupted! The students related. :) - By Asli Irian (Asli Irian) ~~~~~~~ TRIVIA: Underwater Trivia: Hippopotamuses do eighty percent of their vocalization under water. A shark can grow a new set of teeth in a week. A humpback whale's milk is 54 percent fat. The Atlantic Ocean is saltier than the Pacific Ocean. (E-zine: Today's Useless Facts Mailto:Useless_Facts-subscribe@listbot.com) |