Sunday, November 14, 2010

A tale of three cities

This week's three-dot monsterpiece comes from a 15-to-20-year-old group of 3x5 cards that I fished out of the washing machine soaking wet. Because of my fetish for Fount India ink, they were all crisply legible after they dried out.

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This is real music. There's no accordion part. (Roger Melone rehearsing the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra Chorus.)

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There are lots of groups you can go sing in and have fun. (Roger Melone again. He meant that some choruses are only about fun. I personally think singing with this group is about the most fun I've had in my entire life...once the sweating and working are out of the way.)

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Q: What's the difference between a soprano and a seamstress?
A: A seamstress tucks up frills.

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I gotta be stuff and do places! (JS 1995-06-30)

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Q: What's the difference between genius and stupidity?
A: Genius has its limits.

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If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we put them all there? (Brenda Santistevan, 1997-07-10)

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The only thing we have to fear is pheromones. (JS 1995-12-23)

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Who's got time to budget their time? (JS 1996-03-08)

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If your battle plan is going perfectly, you are in an ambush. (Early USENET)

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NM Tech Computer Science professor Victor Yodaiken always referred to our local supermarket as “The Produce Museum”. I have never bought a bag salad there that would last until the third day. Rumor has it that Socorro is the end of the line for three different produce delivery routes, so we get the stuff that nobody in Belen, Carrizozo, or T or C wanted.

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Neologism file: His optimism soon dwaned. (Steve Ingoglia, 1997-4-18; dwindled x waned.)

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Everybody misquotes these lines. I carefully transcribed them during my N thousandth viewing of Wizard of Oz.

“I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore.”
“Now I know we're not in Kansas anymore.”
“I keep forgetting we're not in Kansas.”

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Natalie Derrick: He was Baroque.
Jeff Rhoades: He had no Monet.

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Dump the notes, play the music. (John Murfin, 1996-02-24. John is an outstanding Celtic fiddler who knows approximately 10^13 fiddle tunes.)

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If you could teach your dogs to smoke, they wouldn't chew up your slippers. (John Murfin)

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It's too dark to see flashlights. (Becky Titus, at a Hop Canyon party.)

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I'm very attached to non-attachment. (Me, demonstrating how not to do Buddhism, to Magail Medina, 1995-8-2.)

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Is it still Monday again already? (JS 1996-02-01)

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We have three seasons every month: morning, afternoon, evening, and wrinkled. (JS, 1996-08-24; can't remember what inspired this but the 3x5 card has a note: “Overactive Surrealist gland.”)

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You're born a Patty, then you find the grill. (Jan Thomas)

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Less often than not. (JS 1997-06-12)

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Sub-pessimal. (JS, date unrecorded)

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Q: What do you get when you cross a Unitarian with a Jehovah's Witness?
A: Someone who rings your doorbell for no particular reason.

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Out one ear and in the other. (James Robnett, 1995-10-20)

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The trouble with the rat race is that if you win, you're still a rat. (Anonymous)

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Q: What's the difference between an oboe and an onion?
A: You cry when you're chopping up an onion.

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It's laudable to want to study your errors. But it helps if they aren't coming at you so thick and fast that you can't study them in isolation. (JS 1995-11-19)

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No matter how cynical you get, it's impossible to keep up. (Lily Tomlin)

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I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong. (Bertrand Russell)

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Three dots in the fountain

Shipman family standards: “Purt-nost,” which is sort of a hybrid of “purty near” and “almost.”.

“What time is it?”
“Purt-nost five.”

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One of the commonplaces of reunions is riotous tales out of school, from the days when we were young and foolish (we're old and foolish now.) Like the time some of my friends, under the influence of the Demon Rum, drove their car onto the railroad track at the Socorro station and went as far as they could go. Not sure why, but at the place where they got stuck on the tracks, the car was freed up by the expedient of tipping it into the adjacent irrigation channel.

These are all grownups now, at least nominally. Some of them resent being reminded.

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You can see just by watching him. (Ty Murray, Pro Bull Riding tour announcer and nine-time world champion)

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No foot will remain unshot. (Pat Buckley on the Democratic Party)

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Dogminatrix: one who instructs dog owners in the proper maintenance of the dominance hierarchy. Cesar Millan, for example.

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An American tourist in Belfast was confronted by a masked gunman who demanded, “Catholic or Protestant?” and pointed the gun at him.

The tourist thought for a moment. He had an even chance of being a martyr. Then he got a bright idea and replied, “Actually, I'm Jewish.”

The terrorist smiled through the hole in his ski mask. “I must be the luckiest Arab in Ireland.”

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Vegaquarian: Someone who eats only vegetables and fish. (Lynne Heatwole)

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Merle and Janet Bickford were a married couple of artists that I knew many years ago. They were both sculptors and had a large studio near the Pacific shore where they both worked.

At one point they sculpted each other, in life size, using a wild assortment of scrapbox materials. They were trying to express, they said, the complexity of their relationship. When the pieces were completed, they showed them.

During the showing, one art patron took such violent exception to the ice pick that was buried up to the hilt in the eye of one of the figures that she plucked it out and threw it on the floor. The artists rushed over and put it back in, insisting that that was an important part of the overall composition.

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Bubba and Junior were standing by a flagpole, looking up at it. An attractive blonde engineer walked by and asked them what was going on.

“We need to know the height of this here flagpole,” answered Bubba.

The blonde pulled a wrench out of her pocket, unbolted the flagpole from its base, tipped it over and walked it down, laid it on the ground, pulled the tape measure off her belt, measured it, announced “Eighteen feet, six inches, plus or minus a quarter,” re-installed the flagpole and went on her way.

“Ain't that jest like a woman,” said Junior. “We need the height, and she gives us the length.”

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Non-Euclidean carpentry

To read this story, I'll have to ask you to visit it on my antique 1996-era personal Web pages. You can leave comments here if you like.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Three if by space

As of May 2007, the Owl Bar in San Antonio, NM, went through an average of 300 lbs. of green chile per week. That amounts to about eight tons a year. That does not include the Owl's Albuquerque branch.

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A veritable Who's Who of Who's That. (Richard LeRoy on movies with no one famous in the cast)

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I shoot every third salesman, and #2 just left. (Sign in Prescott Grey's office)

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My dad was fond of three odd lunch items: cervelat (a Swiss sausage), braunschweiger (a soft liver spread—bleah), and Durkee's salad dressing. From the Wikipedia article on the Glidden paint corporation, I learned that Glidden bought Durkee & Co., and that Durkee's sauce was reputedly a favorite of President Lincoln. From Durkee's web page:
In 1857, Eugene R. Durkee created the product that helped make him famous, which today we call Durkee Famous Sauce. It was the first prepared and packaged salad dressing. To appreciate this endeavor, remember, this was created prior to refrigeration. It was carried west by the pioneers. Historians have found old, discarded Durkee dressing bottles along covered-wagon trails. Durkee Famous Sauce was even purported to be stocked in Mary Todd Lincoln's pantry and served to Abraham Lincoln in the White House during the Civil War.

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Hooker: Buy a lady a drink?
Patron: As soon as one shows up.

My friend Frank says he has actually used this line. He is very tall and wide, though. I wouldn't dare. I hate pain.

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Me: Don't mind me, I'm just part of the furniture here.
Dan Lunceford: I would never describe you as furniture. Furniture is utilitarian.

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Four life stages of soprano: bel canto; can belto; can't belto; can't canto.

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There are four types of tenors. A countertenor sings alto and even soprano parts in falsetto voice. Lyric tenors are for light romantic roles, while dramatic tenors are for tragic roles. Heldentenors (literally, “heroic tenors”) are for Wagner.

Two of my voice teachers said that if I had started younger I could have been a Heldentenor. The joke goes that there are four types of tenors:
  • A countertenor has no testicles.
  • A lyric tenor has one.
  • A dramatic tenor has two.
  • A Heldentenor has two, but he is standing on one of them.

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Neologism file: travedy = travesty x tragedy (Laurelle Powers)

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Neologism file: cargyle = the diamond-shaped patch of debris in the middle of a busy intersection that both straight and turning cars miss (Gary Henderson)

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Neologism file: quoozy = queasy x woozy (Nan)

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Perl: The popular version of Intercal. (Dworkin Müller)

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The video game Dance Dance Revolution requires that players dance around on a special mat to score. One friend of mine who was rather overweight at graduation showed up two years later looking quite svelte, and attributed it all to spending significant time playing it.

Marcia said there was a new one called Pole Dance Revolution that was being test-marketed at the Burning Man Festival.

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Goddamn English people have ruined our language. (JS 2009-01-02)

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Eastern New Mexico University in Portales is a first-rate school for music and performing arts, among other departments. However, compared with my alma mater New Mexico Tech, it is somewhat less strong in science.

My friend Phil Johnson and I used to go birding frequently in Boone's Draw, a beautiful wooded tract near Portales that is one of the best birding spots in the state, surrounded as it is for many miles in every direction by treeless grasslands. The spot is also known to ENMU students as a party spot, since it is miles out of town and quite isolated. Tony Gennaro, the science department, told us that there were rumors of devil worship there, but based on our experience camping out one weekend there, Phil judged that beer worship was more likely.

One fine day we encountered a big hulking guy creeping around with a bow and arrow. Turns out that he was a student in an ENMU anthropology course. The instructor had taught them how to make knapped flint arrowheads, and promised this student that if he could successfully slay an actual bunny rabbit with it, he was guaranteed an A.

Three dots for Sister Sara

Excess will not be enough. (Director's advice to Jim Carrey before he made the life-action Grinch movie)

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So it's less of a tossup and more of a toss-off. (Anthony Martinez on XM's classical channel, before they merged with Sirius)

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Five stages of life:
  1. You believe in Santa Claus.
  2. You don't believe in Santa Claus.
  3. You are Santa Claus.
  4. You look like Santa Claus.
  5. You believe in Santa Claus again.

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I nom, therefore I om. (Nan Silvernail; 'om' rhymes with 'Mom'; reference to lolcats)

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Are you out of blinker fluid? (Encouragement to drivers who do not use their turn signals. "Turn signals are a sign of weakness," says Nan.)

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Q: What's the capital of Iceland?
A: $4.30.

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Focus on your own damn family. (Bumper sticker)

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A well-deserved inferiority complex. (Miriam Nadel)

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They're deep-frying everything on a stick these years at State Fairs. Here are some ideas I haven't seen yet:
  • Chitlins.
  • Kim chee.
  • Liver.
  • Lutefisk.

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It's a good thing the shoe bomber didn't hide anything in his ass.

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The little girl started to eat before the blessing. Grandpa admonished her, “In this house, we pray before we eat.”
“But Grandma's a good cook!” protested the little girl.
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I can tell you from long experience that one of the hardest things about choral singing, and especially solos, is knowing when to breathe. A prudent soloist will have required breaths marked in the part well ahead of performance, and perhaps some optional breaths marked that may or may not be used depending on one's wind and the tempo. Which leads to this story about a rising young soprano who shared a stage with one of the most experienced warhorses in all of opera.

RYS: Do you really need that many breaths to get through that?

MEW: Honey, it takes a lot more gas to run a Cadillac than a Volkswagen.

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

As for the Republicans

“As for the Republicans—how can one regard seriously a frightened, greedy, nostalgic huddle of tradesmen and lucky idlers who shut their eyes to history and science, steel their emotions against decent human sympathy, cling to sordid and provincial ideals exalting sheer acquisitiveness and condoning artificial hardship for the non-materially-shrewd, dwell smugly and sentimentally in a distorted dream-cosmos of outmoded phrases and principles and attitudes based on the bygone agricultural-handicraft world, and revel in (consciously or unconsciously) mendacious assumptions (such as the notion that real liberty is synonymous with the single detail of unrestricted economic license or that a rational planning of resource-distribution would contravene some vague and mystical ‘American heritage’…) utterly contrary to fact and without the slightest foundation in human experience? Intellectually, the Republican idea deserves the tolerance and respect one gives to the dead.” (H.P. Lovecraft, 1936)

Hat tip to Digby.