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WITandWISDOM(tm) - September 18, 2007 ISSN 1538-8794 ~~~~~~~ THOUGHTS: The beginning of greatness is to be little. The increase of greatness is to be less. The perfection of greatness is to be nothing. - Author Unknown Source: Monday Fodder by Dave Aufrance, Missionary in Hongkong mailto:daveaufrance@gmail.com?Subject=Subscribe_Monday_Fodder http://www.fishermansnet.com/monday-fodder/ ~~~~~~~ SPECIAL THOUGHTS: At 8:50 am on July 7th, 2005, London’s subway system experienced the unthinkable. In less than sixty seconds, three underground trains were blown up by suicide bombers. In the minutes following the bombings, smoke issuing from the underground tunnels was the only indication of the horrors they contained. Emergency workers rushed to investigate the smoke, and soon the world was rocked by news of the blasts. 39 passengers perished in the explosions. Hundreds more suffered cuts, fractures, and burns. The attack was the worst in London since Nazi air raids in World War II. In the aftermath of the terrorist bombings, Britons demonstrated their trademark courage. Resuming business as usual, they refused to allow fear to dictate how they lived their lives. London’s subway system, The Underground, symbolized the undaunted spirit of the British. Amazingly, thanks to feverish work from maintenance crews, almost the entire Underground was back in operation the morning following the bombings. As the city went through its process of shock and grieving, The Underground was there to serve them. In its June article, “Turning around the London Subway System: From Terrorism to the Olympics,” the University of Pennsylvania’s, Knowledge@Wharton, features, Tim O’Toole, managing director and CEO of The Underground, the man responsible for the resilience of The Underground in the aftermath of the 7/7 bombings. On August 29, 2003, a London power outage forced O’Toole to evacuate a quarter-million passengers from The Underground during rush hour. Not a single injury was reported from the stranded passengers. “That doesn’t happen because of management intervention,” O’Toole asserts, “That happens because people in the field are in control and understand what needs to be done. The thing that makes 14,000 people behave that way is training and competence.” O’Toole has been very intentional in casting a vision his company can grasp and go after. His slogan, “A world-class tube for a world-class city,” has become the rallying cry of The Underground as it implements $40 billion of improvements. The upgrades must all be put in place without disrupting service to London’s 12 to 14 million residents. As O’Toole describes it, “We’ve got to perform open heart surgery on this patient while he plays tennis.” Source: Maximum Impact, http://www.maximumimpact.com ~~~~~~~ THIS & THAT: “Out Of Office” Automatic Email Replies 1. I am currently out at a job interview and will reply to you if I fail to get the position. I may be a little moody so be prepared. 2. You are receiving this automatic notification because I am out of the office. If I was in, chances are you wouldn't have received anything at all. 3. Sorry to have missed you, but I am at the doctor's having my brain removed so I can be promoted to our management team. 4. I will be unable to delete all the unread, worthless emails you send me until I return from vacation. Please be patient, and your mail will be deleted in the order it was received. 5. Thank you for your email. Your credit card has been charged $4.99 for the first 10 words and $1.99 for each additional word in your message. 6. The e-mail server is unable to verify your server connection and is unable to deliver this message. Please restart your computer and try sending again. 7. Thank you for your message, which has been added to a queuing system. You are currently in 352nd place, and can expect to receive a reply in approximately 19 weeks. 8. Hi, I'm thinking about what you've just sent me. Please wait by your PC for my response. 9. I've run away to join a different circus. Source: Laughter for a Saturday mailto:ed548@yahoo.com?subject=Subscribe_to_Laughter_for_a_Saturday ~~~~~~~ KEEP SMILING: A woman visited her parents, who had moved to a small town. She didn't know how small until she went to a video store to rent a movie. When she brought her selection to the clerk and she said she would use her parents' card, the clerk replied, "They've already seen it." Submitted by Betsy ~~~~~~~ TRIVIA: An Australian man has told how he spent a week up a tree in a crocodile-infested swamp and lived to tell the tale. David George, a Cape York stockman, was finally rescued by helicopter in the bush near Coen, in the remote far north of Queensland. "Every night I was stalked by two crocs who would sit at the bottom of the tree staring up at me," Mr George told local paper The Courier-Mail. "I'd yell out at them, 'I'm not falling out of this tree for you bastards'." Dazed and bleeding after a tumble from his horse, Mr George found himself in the heart of a swamp - and then fell straight into a crocodile nest. "I couldn't go back, it was too far and too dangerous, so I headed to the nearest high ground and stayed there, hoping someone would come and find me before the crocs did," he said. He tried in vain to attract the attention of airborne search teams, including flashing sunlight off his tobacco tin, waving his shirt on a stick and spreading toilet paper in the tree branches. Three days into his ordeal and his food supply of two meat sandwiches was gone. "If I hadn't seen the crocs circling me, and if I hadn't fallen into the croc nest, I would have made a push for it. But I knew the safest thing was for me to sit tight and wait." On the eighth day of his ordeal, the missing stockman was found after a search involving the Australian Army, police and Aboriginal trackers. Source: Ananova (August 17, 2007) http://www.ananova.com