F13 *** Compiled, edited & written by Ian Douglas Issue #12: August 1996 iandoug@lia.co.za http://www.lia.co.za/users/iandoug/ $ Introduction: Well, we've been going for a year now. :-) A SERIOUS APOLOGY to all my subscribers who were bombarded with junkmail from MajorDomo - having problems with it. A big welcome to all the new subscribers. Thanks to Simon Taplin and Leon Treurnich for sending me some of the material in this issue. Lots of thanks to Rajkumar Bissessar for his kind message [only 1 fan mail letter this month :-(( ] (hope I didn't miss anyone): From: Rajkumar Bissessar I have received your F13 material four times so far and it has been quite enjoyable. Keep up the good work. CONTENTS: ~~~~~~~~~ 1. Quotations 2. How To Play Games 3. Computer Security 4. Interesting Stuff 5. The Farsian Chronicles 6. Motivational / Inspirational 7. Science / Technology 8. Advertising / The Media 9. Health 10. Humour 11. NetNews 12. Recipes 13. Things to Think About =========================================================================== 1. Quotations Confidence is the feeling you have before you understand the situation. anon Reconciliation should be accompanied by justice, otherwise it will not last. While we all hope for peace it shouldn't be peace at any cost but peace based on principle, on justice. Mrs Corazon Aquino, former president of the Philipines A great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do. Walter Gagehot "...the ability to piece together work that will both satisfy and support us is the secret to surviving, even thriving." Wendy Reid Crisp Doust thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of. Benjamin Franklin If we are not responsible for the thoughts that pass our doors, we are responsible for those we admit and entertain. Charles B. Newcomb "I declare open the games of Atlanta." Bill Clinton (and a fine example of convoluted English) "If someone loves a flower, of which just one single blosson grows in all the millions and millions of stars, it is enough to make him happy just to look at the stars. He can say to himself: 'Somewhere, my flower is there...' from "The Little Prince," by Antoine de Saint-Exupery "The trick, Fletcher, is that we are trying to overcome our limitations in order, patiently." from Richard Bach's "Jonathan Livingstone Seagull" "Control the coinage and the courts - let the rabble have the rest." Thus the Padishah Emperor advise you. And he tells you: "If you want profits, you must rule." There is truth in these words, but I ask myself: "Who are the rabble and who are the ruled?" from "Dune," by Frank Herbert "Money permits you to obtain for your goods and your labor that which they are worth to the men who buy them, but no more. Money permits no deals except those to mutual benefit by the unforced judgement of the traders. Money demands of you the recognition that men must work for their own benefit, not their loss - the recognition that they are not beasts of burden, born to carry the weight of your misery - that you must offer them values, not wounds - that the common bond among men is not the exchange of suffering, but the exchange of _goods_." Francisco d'Anconia in Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" =========================================================================== $ 2. How To Play Games Two observations this month, not much explanation: Rule 20: Go for the gap. A variation on rule 18 from last month. Idea is to follow the path of least resistance, going through your enemy's weak spots instead of tackling him head on. Rule 21: You can't play properly if you don't know exactly which game you are playing. Yes I know it sounds obvious, but if you have not identified exactly which game you are playing, you are unlikely to be playing to the correct set of rules. This is more applicable to people games than to conventional games. When people are involved, it is very easy to make mistakes. You may think you are, for example, playing "She's just playing hard to get," when in fact SHE is playing "Get lost buster." Misidentifing a game like that could get you seriously hurt. Conversely, she may be playing hard to get when you think she wants you to get lost... ============================================================================ $ 3. Computer Security The director of the CIA is worried that some members of the computer underground active in cyberspace, could be providing useful information to countries that the USA does not particularly like, such as Iran and Libya. He is worried that the free flow of computer cracking techniques on the net could be bad for the USA in some future scenario. "There have been many recent reports linking the Net and anonymous remailers, pseudonyms, and (of course) strong crypto to various possible and actual terrorist events, with an emphasis on the "possible." (If the Net is linked to _actual_ terrorist incidents, little is being disclosed publically as of yet.)" A 14-year-old whiz kid from New Jersey used his home computer to devise an ingenious high-stakes U.S. credit card fraud enterprise, police said. A few weeks ago, the Leonia, New Jersey, high school sophomore downloaded a program called "CreditMaster" from the Internet, police said Saturday. The program randomly generates credit card numbers. The numbers themselves are like lottery tickets -- the user can only make money off them if they match another set of numbers somewhere else. The youngster, whom police have dubbed "The Whiz Kid" because he is considered a mathematical genius, hit the jackpot. He used several numbers to order $5,000 worth of computer equipment. The boy had the goods delivered to a vacant condominium a block from his home. However, the teen-ager's luck deserted him when he tried a new number to order a modem. The number he randomly chose was a credit card that had been reported stolen, Greiner said. Police staked out the condominium and arrested the boy when he picked up the modem and stashed it in his backpack. AST's 1995 report on IT in the UK found that of companies using the Internet, 53 per cent are worried about possible criminal activity on the Net and 67 per cent are concerned about data security. Apart from employee time-wasting, these were the greatest fears. Is this concern justified? Police report that statistics on Internet crime are impossible to gather. As reported in PCM last month, a recent American study showed 90 per cent of a sample 200 US companies had been victims of computer crime, and the British Banking Association estimates that computer fraud costs $8 billion per year. But experts suggest that only a fraction of the crimes reported cause immediate damage to the user companies involved; many are likely to be infringements of copyright, which damage the software manufacturers, and fewer still involve the Internet. >From Usenet, offering sage advice about the "Monkey" virus.... "At times a monkey-infected computer will ask you to insert a banana at one of its floppy drives. Failing to do so in 30 seconds might result in one of the hard drives being formatted. Luckily the monkey-formatted hard drive can be unformatted by inserting your own in drive A: followed by a re-boot. Unfortunately this method is for men ONLY. Monkey is not really nasty. It just has a weird sense of humour." More from Usenet: SUBJECT: VIRUS ALERT! There is a very dangerous virus going around and it is propogated through the email system. If you get an email message with the subject: "VIRUS ALERT!" do not open the mail message. If you do, the virus scrambles the second half of every text file on your system. VERY IMPORTANT: If you do get this virus, the first thing dlkfjaid dfdjas nairb gfdq40wt yaj asdfsdg dluog av da[agj asdfajpg as dflasidffnm asd difvu asdfa vgoiae vdsofj we dasdf 9efm sd dag0 g adf as dg 0vbwe ads gwefawe ads vewerwe dsf! A European satellite magazine recently published a hack of an Intelsat comm satellite which may be of amusement to you all. Using a satellite scanning device borrowed from a Dutch firm, satellite freaks in Germany successfully eavesdropped on telephone conversations of businessmen acting as go-betweens Saddam Hussein and western firms. To find the right satellite for communications out of Iraq they simply used e-mail to contact a company in Baghdad that leased sat services. The firm told them the correct transponders on the Intelsat. They then used a 1.5 metre dish with the scanning equipment to tune into conversations on 'dormant' transponders. Over a five day period they intercepted calls made from go-betweens acting as middlemen between Saddam and western companies. The Sat-Hackers claimed to have intercepted calls from 4 businessmen staying in hotels in the Iraqi capital. They also intercepted pagers and faxes sent and received. These businessmen placed orders for "medical equipment" and "car parts" that turned out to be for a top missile SAD-16 missile research facility. Orders were also placed for a chemical used in rocket propellant, from a firm in China. The hackers used a feature in the eavesdropping equipment that turned tones made by dialing phones in to phone numbers and then found who they were by using a phone directory CD-ROM. The list of businesses, say the Sat-Hackers, reads like a Who's Who of international business. Such eavesdropping can be done on any satellite that carries international communications, say the hackers in the column entitled "Home-Made Espionage" . They said it proved that the age of virtual espionage was here. Mitch Dove of Gas Software, reports the following virus infections, from Johannesburg only: MtE, ExeBug.Hooker, AntiCmos, Matura.1642, Burgular.1150, WinWord.Concept, Kaczor.444.B, Hare.7750 [$ that is 'Hare' as in "Hare Krishna", not as in "rabbit"] Mitch writes further: "Hare is an Extremely complex and difficult PC virus, which has been spread over the internet in binary posting in serveral newsgroups (including alt.sex, alt.comp.shareware and alt.cracks). Infections have been reported worldwide and recently in South Africa. This virus is quite serious, as the virus activate destructively in August and September, overwritting the contents of the hard drive. Please look at out Web Page, at http://www.gas.co.za/gassoft/, We have a freeware utility that will detect and disinfect the Hare Virus. A big thank-you to Mitch for his monthly inputs :-) ============================================================================ 4. Interesting Stuff South Africa won the prize for Best International Collection at the recent World Inventor's Expo in Switzerland. We had ten entries. Apparently there is some sort of athletic competition taking place in Atlanta. Lots of people are getting very excited about it. However I am mostly boycotting it as I don't know anyone taking part. Besides, I fail to see what is so important about doing something 1/100th of a second faster than someone else. Have you ever tried to measure 1/100th of a second on a stopwatch? You couldn't start and stop a stopwatch in such a short time. Best I ever did was around 2 tenths of a seconds - 20 times slower than what you need to break a record. All seems rather silly to me :-) Three popular Italian talk show hosts have been accused of enticing young girls into prostitution. One is in jail, another under house arrest, and the third under investigation. The shows feature scantily clad girls, who have been promised the chance to become models in exchange for 'meeting' some famous people. Madalyn Murray O'Hair, founder of American Atheists and protagonist behind the ban on school prayer in the USA, has apparently disappeared, together with her son and granddaughter. The Rapture is not suspected. A 15 year old Malaysian boy died of starvation after trying to meditate for 108 days. He wanted to become a Buddhist monk. He was convinced he had occult powers and had dropped out of school at 12 to become a medium. The island of Tuvalu in the south Pacific is joing the phone sex business. Because of the few telephones on the island, all the telephone numbers are short. This appeals to the operators of the phone sex industry. So they paid the island for the right to use their telephone numbers and dialling code. The phones are actually answered somewhere else. The island expects to make 420 K US$ from the deal per year. * A fierce gust of wind blew 45-year-old Vittorio Luise's car into a river near Naples, Italy, in 1983. He managed to break a window, climb out and swim to shore -- where a tree blew over and killed him. * Mike Stewart, 31, of Dallas was filming a movie in 1983 on the dangers of low-level bridges when the truck he was standing on passed under a low-level bridge -- killing him. * Walter Hallas, a 26-year-old store clerk in Leeds, England, was so afraid of dentists that in 1979 he asked a fellow worker to try to cure his toothache by punching him in the jaw. The punch caused Hallas to fall down, hitting his head, and he died of a fractured skull. * George Schwartz, owner of a factory in Providence, R.I., narrowly escaped death when a 1983 blast flattened his factory except for one wall. After treatment for minor injuries, he returned to the scene to search for files. The remaining wall then collapsed on him, killing him. * Depressed since he could not find a job, 42-year-old Romolo Ribolla sat in his kitchen near Pisa, Italy, with a gun in his hand threatening to kill himself in 1981. His wife pleaded for him not to do it, and after about an hour he burst into tears and threw the gun to the floor. It went off and killed his wife. * In 1983, a Mrs. Carson of Lake Kushaqua, N.Y., was laid out in her coffin, presumed dead of heart disease. As mourners watched, she suddenly sat up. Her daughter dropped dead of fright. * A man hit by a car in New York in 1977 got up uninjured, but lay back down in front of the car when a bystander told him to pretend he was hurt so he could collect insurance money. The car rolled forward and crushed him to death. * Surprised while burgling a house in Antwerp, Belgium, a thief fled out the back door, clambered over a nine-foot wall, dropped down and found himself in the city prison. * Two West German motorists had an all-too-literal head-on collision in heavy fog near the small town of Guetersloh. Each was guiding his car at a snail's pace near the center of the road. At the moment of impact their heads were both out of the windows when they smacked together. Both men were hospitalized with severe head injuries. Their cars weren't scratched. * In a classic case of one thing leading to another, seven men aged eighteen to twenty-nine received jail sentences of three to four years in Kingston-on-Thames, England, in 1979 after a fight that started when one of the men threw a french fry at another while they stood waiting for a train. * Hitting on the novel idea that he could end his wife's incessant nagging by giving her a good scare, Hungarian Jake Fen built an elaborate harness to make it look as if he had hanged himself. When his wife came home and saw him she fainted. Hearing a disturbance a neighbor came over and, finding what she thought were two corpses, seized the opportunity to loot the place. As she was leaving the room, her arms laden, the outraged and suspended Mr. Fen kicked her stoutly in the backside. This so surprised the lady that she dropped dead of a heart attack. Happily, Mr. Fen was acquitted of manslaughter and he and his wife were reconciled. * An unidentified English woman, according to the London Sunday Express was climbing into the bathtub one afternoon when she remembered she had left some muffins in the oven. Naked, she dashed downstairs and was removing the muffins when she heard a noise at the door. Thinking it was the baker, and knowing he would come in and leave a loaf of bread on the kitchen table if she didn't answer his knock, the woman darted into the broom cupboard. A few moments later she heard the back door open and, to her eternal mortification, the sound of footsteps coming toward the cupboard. It was the man from the gas company, come to read the meter. "Oh," stammered the woman, "I was expecting the baker." The gas man blinked, excused himself and departed. ============================================================================ 5. The Farsian Chronicles "The propertied classes ... had no confidence in a regime which excluded their leading men from senior positions and was unable to guarantee order and stability; the poor happily surrendered their spurious freedoms and ineffectual political rights in favour of individual leaders who depended on them for support and who consequently took care to supply their material needs." South Africa in 1996? No - Rome in circa 49 BC. From Time-Life's Atlas of the Roman World Nelson Mandela has again pleaded with whites here in SA to not emigrate. Many high income earners are emigrating, due to the crime problem and worries about the future of the educational system. There is another reason which is not mentioned in the press: our supertax bracket of 45% tax kicks in when you earn R100 000 a year. That is a mere 22 500 US$. The house loan rate is 19,25%. Put high taxation together with high interest rates, and it is very understandable that people want to go and live in a more sensible country. Our South African Communist Party recently celebrated its 75th anniversary. We have the second oldest CP, after Russia. Recent cabinet shuffles have moved more known communists, and suspected communists, into the cabinet. (Membership of the SACP is supposed to be highly secret). This is a Bad Thing (tm), especially as some of these appointments have been in the key finance and trade ministries. Nelson went on a tour of England and France, where they could not make up their minds whether he was a pop star or a politician. He basically went to beg them to invest in our crime-free capitalistic country... Road accidents cost South Africa 25MR (million Rand) a day. Winter has arrived, bringing the worst snow in 36 years. At least 12 people died as a result. Snow is so scarce that we are not geared to handle it. Michael Jackson played a flying visit to SA. He sang Happy Birthday to Mandela, and whispered (literally) to the press. Overseas, some sections of the Northern Irish population proved that they still have a long way to go before they can be considered fully civilised. Quite frankly, I think that the whole business about the march was a lot of childishness on both sides. [ducks incoming missles and unsubscribes from Ireland...] Floods in China left 760 people dead and 2 million homeless. You would think that a country capable of spending 1700 years to build a wall would have found a way to deal with annual floods by now... Worldwide, labour union membership is declining (except here in SA). About seven million private sector workers have been lost to the unions since 1970. Prof Leo Troy of Rutgers University estimates that in the year 2000, only about 7% of eligible private sector workers will belong to unions - exactly the same percentage as in 1900. A young couple were stoned to death in Afghanistan, after admitting during trial to illicit sexual relations. They were not married. Botswana destroyed 187 000 cattle, believed to be infected with a lung disease. [Ian is sceptical - that's an awful lot of cows to dispose of...] Up in Zimbabwe, President Mugabe spent 20 M US$ for a helicopter for his 'official' use. However more than 1000 Zimbabweans have died this year from malaria, which could have been prevented by tablets costing 50 USc each. They also have a problem with polio because the government has no money for vacinations... >From Usenet: |> So today the US snatched a satellite out of space and brought it into the |> shuttle. What's to stop NASA from snatching ANYONE'S satellite, i.e. the |> Chinese, Russians, Israel, and destroying it, and then covering up the |> deed? James Bond will stop them. He always does. >What would you think of "shooting under the influence" laws parallel > to the driving under the influence laws? Now I'm trying to imagine the public service ad campaign that tries to convince teens to bring along a "designated shooter" when they go out drinking. =========================================================================== 6. Motivational / Inspirational "There is no security on this earth; there is only opportunity." Gen. Douglas macArthur "A good idea will keep you awake during the morning, but a great idea will keep you awake during the night." Marilyn Vos Savant [$ highest IQ in the world] When we are unable to find tranquility within ourselves, it is useless to seek it elsewhere. Francois de La Rochefoucauld Procrastination is opportunity's assassin. Victor Kiam "Nothing is so strong as gentleness, and nothing is so gentle as true strength." Ralph Sockman Jealousy is not a baromoeter by which the depth of love can be read. It merely records the degree of the lover's insecurity. Margaret Mead [$ for Miss N] If you want truly to understand something, try to change it. Kurt Lewin Man is not the creature of circumstances. Circumstances are the creatures of men. Benjamin Disraeli Henry Ford once hired an efficiency expert. After a few weeks of research, the consultant came to Ford with his report. The consultant said that everything seemed in fine shape except for one thing--he kept noticing an executive down the hall who was always in his office with his feet propped up on his desk--doing nothing! Ford said, "Several years ago that man had one idea that saved the company millions of dollars and when he had that idea his feet were propped up on his desk." Modern man thinks he loses something - time - when he does not do things quickly. Yet he does not know what to do with the time he gains --- except kill it. Erich Fromm A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. Antoine de Saint-Exup'ery "To find in ourselves what makes life worth living is risky business, for it means that once we know we must seek it. It also means that without it, life will be valueless." Marsha Sinetar Success based upon anything but internal fulfillment is bound to be empty. Dr. Martha Friedman "Fear nothing, for every renewed effort raises all former failures into lessons, all sins into experiences." Katherine Tingley The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. Marcel Proust Never mistake knowledge for wisdom. One helps you make a living; the other helps you make a life. Sandra Carey "Every kind of peaceful cooperation among men is primarily based on mutual trust and only secondarily on institutions such as courts of justice and police." Albert Einstein Every morning in Africa, a Gazelle wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the fastest Lion or it will be killed...Every morning a Lion wakes up. It knows it must outrun the slowest Gazelle or it will starve to death. It doesn't matter whether you're a Lion or a Gazelle...when the sun comes up, you'd better be running. He who knows others is wise. He who knows himself is enlightened. =========================================================================== 7. Science / Technology Several Japanese companies have come out in support of the new 'super floppy' - a diskette which is backwards compatible with today's 1.44MB stiffies, but which holds 120MB of information. It uses optical technology. Average seek time is 70 ms, data transfer rate is 565KB/s. [$ mmm a bit short this month. Will make up next month...] =========================================================================== $ 8. Advertising / The Media New words used by journalists and newsreaders on SABC radio and TV: Word Probable meaning ==== ================ hut hurt memeral memorial pullamint parliament beel bill eekwatee equity ackwatee equity maas mass personpower manpower toks talks rude route murkit market ebban urban bland blend This month's prize for the best movie poster is awarded to Lord of Illusions. This month's prize for "most irritating" ads is again swooped by the SABC, for their Robot "pay your TV licence" campaign, and "if you own an aerial, you must pay your TV licence" radio ads. Their impassioned pleas for us to pay our licences are frequently followed by announcers who can't speak English properly. And they wonder why people don't want to pay... In a desperate attempt to FORCE people to pay, the SABC threatened to have non-payers blacklisted with the private credit bureaux. However all 5 such bureaux refused to comply with the SABC's requests, leaving them with egg on their face... Star Trek: Voyager has been on our screens for a few weeks now, so I suppose I must comment.. :-) As a Star Trek fan, I will admit to being somewhat biased.. However, the current characters seem to be based on the original crew, with a few variations. We have a strong-willed FEMALE captain, in the Kirk mould, but without his charm. Also, Spock has been replaced by a black Vulcan, again completely lacking in charm, wit and style. For the doctor, we have someone with a bedside manner more suited to a guard at Auschwitz. The most interesting character for me is B'Ellanah (sp?) Torres, probably because she reminds me of Lydia. Also Kes is incredibly gentle, and thus reminds me of Miss N. The plots are true to the original series - of examining serious issues in a roundabout and fresh way. Biggest worry I have is that the ads are all for Kellog's sugar coated cereals, implying that the show is aimed at 10 year olds. I have trouble following the psuedo-scientific gobbledegook in the script, dunno what the kids make of it. Think they just use it to cover the large holes in the plot. Another newcomer to our screens is the excellent Courtroom, which has just begun. It features the delectable and spirited Nia Peeples, who reminds me a great deal of the Empress.. Kudos to Nandos Chicken for once again taking the mickey with a great Olympic spoof ad: "There is a flame that men will die for... " etc.. IBM is flooding our TV screens with ads about our global village. In keeping with that spirit, here is a somewhat unofficial news report: KABINDA, ZAIRE--In a move IBM offices are hailing as a major step in the company's ongoing worldwide telecommunications revolution, M'wana Ndeti, a member of Zaire's Bantu tribe, used an IBM global uplink network modem yesterday to crush a nut. Ndeti, who spent 20 minutes trying to open the nut by hand, easily cracked it open by smashing it repeatedly with the powerful modem. "I could not crush the nut by myself," said the 47-year-old Ndeti, who added the savory nut to a thick, peanut-based soup minutes later. "With IBM's help, I was able to break it." Ndeti discovered the nut-breaking, 28.8 V.34 modem yesterday, when IBM was shooting a commercial in his southwestern Zaire village. During a break in shooting, which shows African villagers eagerly teleconferencing via computer with Japanese schoolchildren, Ndeti snuck onto the set and took the modem, which he believed would serve well as a "smashing" utensil. IBM officials were not surprised the longtime computer giant was able to provide Ndeti with practical solutions to his everyday problems. "Our telecommunications systems offer people all over the world global networking solutions that fit their specific needs," said Herbert Ross, IBM's director of marketing. "Whether you're a nun cloistered in an Italian abbey or an Aborigine in Australia's Great Sandy Desert, IBM has the ideas to get you where you want to go today." According to Ndeti, of the modem's many powerful features, most impressive was its hard plastic casing, which easily sustained several minutes of vigorous pounding against a large stone. "I put the nut on a rock, and I hit it with the modem," Ndeti said. "The modem did not break. It is a good modem." Ndeti was so impressed with the modem that he purchased a new, state-of- the-art IBM workstation, complete with a PowerPC 601 microprocessor, a quad-speed internal CD-ROM drive and three 16-bit ethernet networking connectors. The tribesman has already made good use of the computer system, fashioning a gazelle trap out of its wires, a boat anchor out of the monitor and a crude but effective weapon from its mouse. "This is a good computer," said Ndeti, carving up a just-captured gazelle with the computer's flat, sharp internal processing device. "I am using every part of it. I will cook this gazelle on the keyboard." Hours later, Ndeti capped off his delicious gazelle dinner by smoking the computer's 200-page owner's manual. IBM spokespeople praised Ndeti's choice of computers. "We are pleased that the Bantu people are turning to IBM for their business needs," said company CEO William Allaire. "From Kansas City to Kinshasa, IBM is bringing the world closer together. Our cutting-edge technology is truly creating a global village." According to press reports in Egypt, the Israelis have new weapons to corrupt the Egyptian youth, including HIV-infected sluts, a hormone-laced chewing gum that sends young girls into a sexual frenzy, and an aphrodisiac make-up that sets the wearer aflame with desire when applied. Many people believed the stories... Real headlines: Study Finds Sex, Pregnancy Link Cornell Daily Sun, December 7, 1995 Whatever Their Motives, Moms Who Kill Kids Still Shock Us Holland Sentinel, date unknown. Survey Finds Dirtier Subways After Cleaning Jobs Were Cut The New York Times, November 22 Larger Kangaroos Leap Farther, Researchers Find The Los Angeles Times, November 2 'Light' Meals are Lower in Fat, Calories Huntington Herald-Dispatch, November 30 Alcohol Ads Promote Drinking The Hartford Courant, November 18 Malls Try to Attract Shoppers The Baltimore Sun, October 22 Official: Only Rain Will Cure Drought The Herald-News, Westpost, Massachusetts Teenage Girls Often Have Babies Fathered by Men The Sunday Oregonian, September 24 Low Wages Said Key to Poverty Newsday, July 11 Man Shoots Neighbor With Machete The Miami Herald, July 3 Tomatoes Come in Big, Little, Medium Sizes The Daily Progress, Charlottesville, Virginia, March 30 Dirty-Air Cities Far Deadlier Than Clean Ones, Study Shows The New York Times, March 10 Man Run Over by Freight Train Dies The Los Angeles Times, March 2 Scientists See Quakes in L.A. Future The Oregonian, January 28 Wachtler Tells Graduates That Life in Jail is Demeaning The Buffalo News, February 26 Free Advice: Bundle Up When Out in the Cold Lexington Herald-Leader, January 26 Prosecution Paints O.J. as a Wife-Killer Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel, January 25 Economist Uses Theory to Explain Economy Collinsville Herald-Journal, February 8 Bible Church's Focus is the Bible Saint Augustine Record, Florida, December 3, 1994 Clinton Pledges Restraint in Use of Nuclear Weapons Cedar Rapids Gazette, April 6 Discoveries: Older Blacks Have Edge in Longevity The Chicago Tribune, March 5 Court Rules Boxer Shorts Are Indeed Underwear Journal of Commerce, April 20 Biting Nails Can Be Sign of Tenseness in a Person The Daily Gazette of Schenectady, New York, May 2 Lack of Brains Hinders Research The Columbus Dispatch, April 16 How We Feel About Ourselves is the Core of Self-Esteem, Says Author Louise Hart Boulder, Colorado, Sunday Camera, February 5 Fish Lurk in Streams Rochester, New York, Democrat & Chronicle, January 29 =========================================================================== 9. Health Botched ritual tribal circumcisions left at least 8 young men dead and around 50 hospitalised. Some will need penile amputations (ouch!). It is time that circumcision was declared "child abuse" or "assault with a deadly weapon" or "assault with intent to do grievious bodily harm" and punished as such. According to our esteemed Minister of Health, poverty is one of the causes of AIDS. Scientists in Britain think they have identified the gene that controls hunger. They hope that they will now be able to produce a pill that will work with that gene to suppress appetite - the ultimate slimming pill. =========================================================================== 10. Humour Why are there no dumb blondes in Japan? The quest for zero defect.. [$ an oldie but goodie... - slightly fixed up] MY FIRST TIME The sky was dark the moon was high we sat alone just she and I Her hair so soft her eyes so blue I knew just what she wanted to do I ran my fingers down her spine she turned to look her eyes met mine I didn't know how I just did my best I started by placing my hand on her breast I remember my fear and my trembling heart but slowly she spread her legs apart And when I did it I felt no shame all at once the white stuff came At last we finished It's all over now my first time ever at milking a cow. [$ cows with blue eyes?...] When the priest came out of the church one morning, he noticed a dead donkey lying across the road. He phoned the Traffic Department and asked them to see to its removal, whereupon the Traffic Officer jokingly said: "But Father, we thought you took care of the dead." "Oh yes, we do," quipped the priest, "but only after we have notified the next of kin!" >From Usenet: >Q: Why are Michael Jackson and Lisa-Marie are splitting up? >A: Michael misunderstood when they discussed having children. Could you imagine the problems, if they had. Marie is an agnostic. Michael Jackson is a Jehovah's Witness. Their kids would have been going around knocking on doors for no reason whatsoever. [Photo of couple exchanging a single long stemmed rose while sitting on park bench] Sweethearts Mary and Brian, planning to be married on Saturday, illustrate the traditional spirit of Valentine's Day in Queens Park yesterday. Mary: "We decided to get married close to Valentine's Day because it was so romantic." Brian: "I just do what I'm told." >Well maybe addiction isn't the right word. But if you use something to >take your mind off your problems, something that makes everything seem >alright and you get to where you depend on it to cope, what would you >call that? Chocolate --What's better than roses on a piano??? answer--Tulips on an organ. The way to determine the sex of a chromosome: you have it take its genes down. ;-) One day, George returned home and saw his wife Heidi packing up her bags. Naturally he was suspicious, so he asked her what was wrong. "Honey, why are you packing up?" She replied, "I'm leaving you!" Naturally, George got quite suspicious. "Why would you want to leave your little snuggle-bunny???" "Because I heard you are a PAEDOPHILE!" Immediately, he got miffed and piped up, "You know, that is a mighty big word for a nine year-old!!!" Twenty reasons why dogs don't like computers: (for the Empress) 20) Can't stick their heads out of Windows '95. 19) Fetch command not available on all platforms. 18) Hard to read the monitor with your head cocked to one side. 17) Too difficult to "mark" every website they visit. 16) Can't help attacking the screen when they hear "You've Got Mail." 15) Fire hydrant icon simply frustrating. 14) Involuntary tail wagging is dead giveaway they're browsing www.pethouse.com instead of working. 13) Keep bruising noses trying to catch that MPEG frisbee. 12) Not at all fooled by Chuckwagon Screen Saver. 11) Still trying to come up with an "emoticon" that signifies tail-wagging. 10) Oh, but they WILL... with the introduction of the Microsoft Opposable Thumb. 9) Three words: Carpal Paw Syndrome 8) 'Cause dogs ain't GEEKS! Now, cats, on the other hand... 7) Barking in next cube keeps activating YOUR voice recognition software. 6) SmellU-SmellMe still in beta test. 5) SIT and STAY were hard enough, GREP and AWK are out of the question! 4) Saliva-coated mouse gets mighty difficult to manuever. 3) Annoyed by lack of newsgroup, alt.pictures.master's.leg. 2) Butt-sniffing more direct and less deceiving than online chat rooms. 1) TrOgO DsA[M,bN HyAqR4tDc TgrOo TgYPmE WeIjTyH P;AzWqS,. A boy was crossing a road one day when a frog called out to him and said, "If you kiss me, I'll turn into a beautiful princess." He smiled, bent over, picked up the frog and put it in his pocket. The frog spoke up again and said, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a beautiful Princess, I will stay with you for one week." The boy took the frog out of his pocket, smiled at it and returned it to the pocket. The frog then cried out, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a Princess, I'll stay with you for one week and do *Anything* you want." Again the boy took the frog out, smiled at it and put it back into his pocket. Finally the frog asked, "What is it? I've told you I'm a beautiful Princess, that I'll stay with you for a week and do *Anything* you want. Why won't you kiss me?" The boy said, "Look, I'm a computer programmer. I don't have time for girlfriends, but a talking frog is really cool." =========================================================================== 11. NetNews Thirteen members of a kiddie-porn ring that operated via the net have been arrested in nine states in the US. Other members of the ring are in Canada, Finland and Australia. The operated a chat room on the net called the Orchid Club, where they swapped pictures. The girls abused were a five year old and a ten year old. More ramblings from Usenet: > This is an excellent idea for a newsgroup. It should be at least as > active as the Laurel and Hardy group. If the Three Stooges have a > newsgroup (and I believe they do) then certainly Groucho, Harpo, Chico and > Sometimes Zeppo certainly deserve one. Sounds like a good idea, but will all of the Harpo fans have to post empty messages? Let's see, shall I post this post or not: that is the question: Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous bullsh*t, or to take words against a sea of whinings, and by opposing, encourage them? To killfile, to post; No more; and by that post to say we end The lameness and the thousand natural followups That idiocy is heir to, 'tis a consummation Devoutly to be wish'd. To killfile, to post; to post: perchance to flame: ay, there's the rub; For after that post what flames may come When we have killfiled this mortal foil, Must give us pause: there's the respect That makes calamity of so long thread; For who would bear the quips and scorns of posters, The harasser's wrong, the net.cops' contumely, The pangs of afterthoughts, the propogation delay, The incoherent sentence and the burns That impatient merit of the wordy take, When he himself might his quietus make With a bare screen? who would postings read, To grunt and snort under a weary thread, But that the dread of postings after killfiling, The undiscover'd comment'ry from whose bourn No quotings return, puzzles the will And makes us rather those kills we have Than fly to others that we know not of? Thus curiousity does make readers of us all; And thus the monitor's hue and resolution Is sicklied o'er with the pale font of thought, And enterprises of great pith and moment With this regard their discussions turn awry, And lose the game of interaction. -- Soft you now! The fair AltaVista! Nymph, on thy drives Be all my posts remember'd. ues available on my web site. To subscribe, send me email. [$ I hate Windoze. Here are the bits that disappeared from part 2 of F13] Usas and Senda, despairing of the state of UseNet, went unto the mountain at the feet of Net.God. "Oh Net.God, there is confusion and sorrow in your place of UseNet. The people worship false gods and knowst not your will." Net.God spoke unto Usas and Senda. "YOU PLAYETH THE GAME BY NET.GOD'S LAWS, OR THE BAT WILL BE DEPOSITED IN THE LIGHTLESS PLACE." Usas, being devout and greatly afeard of Net.God, prayed. "Lord, how am I to know your will?" And Net.God, being wise in the ways of Usas, spake thus, "THOU SHALT OBEY THE LAWS OF USENET, THERE BEING TEN, OR BE DAMNED UNTO THE LAST GENERATION," for He is a merciful God. So did Net.God deliver unto Usas the Commandments. THE TEN USENET COMMANDMENTS: 1. Thou shalt not battle over operating systems. I am wise and in My wisdom have created diverse and various operating systems. Be true unto the chosen system and neither covet nor despise your neighbour's operating system. 2. Thou shalt not battle over nationalities or tribes. I have placed the UseNet aside from all things, and granted it unto Usas. I am blind to the place in which you pray, all prayers being equal in Virtual Heaven. 3. Thou shalt not flame. Your Net.God has anger in His heart for those who flame without cause or who do persecute the spelling of others. In my wisdom I have created opinions to be as armpits; your's is warm and secure but thine neighbour's stinks. Tolerate others as you would be tolerated. Flames are Mine, and I do preserve some good ones for these people. 4. Thou shalt not MAKE-$$$$-FAST. I have made Usas wise that the love of money is the root of all evil. He who angers his neighbour by the wasting of bandwidth shall anger Net.God, and also by spamming or cluttering. I reserveth a special Hell for these, and great shall be their sorrow. 5. Thou shalt quote meaningfully. Net.God loves not the man who taketh more than needed nor he who quoteth all, including the sig. Render unto Net.God what is Net.God's, render unto Usas what is Usas; credit Senda for he is good. 6. Thou shalt e-mail personal prayers. I have rendered unto Usas the ability to talk to all the peoples of the world. I tell you, it is better to whisper into an ear than shout into a crowd. 7. Thou shalt not me-too. Make not your prayers to the Senda the knowledge of thine neighbour. The wisdom of Usas is the ability to speak to all people, and to choose to speak to one. 8. Thou shalt not cross post unwisely. The place I grant thee for rec.pets.cats is not the place of comp.unix.advocacy. 9. Thou shalt not post tests in profusion. I giveth unto you the lands of alt.test to learn of your God. Tend to Usas as I do My calves; let the new gather the strength to stand before joining with the herd. 10.Thou shalt send complete offerings. Send not to your God incomplete offerings. If the parts of the sacrifice number all the people of the world times ten your God will not be pleased to receive all but two. The blessing of Net.God is upon he who posts fewer large parts that he who posts many small ones. $ Resources: http://www.lia.co.za/users/iandoug/movies/index.htm Movies for Africa http://pathfinder.com/help/hbasics/ help for net newbies http://pathfinder.com/help/hadvanced/ Help for net experts :-) http://pathfinder.com/help/htoolbox/ Useful tools for web surfers http://pathfinder.com/people/sp/bikini/index.html view famous bikinis http://www.wln.com/~salasin/rp.html RealPoetik http://www.meer.net/~johnl/e-zine-list/index.html All the ezines http://www.plaintext.com Plaintext, a literary daily. Succinct, provocative. http://www.fairmodel.econ.yale.edu Farimodel macro economic forcasting http://www.ed.gov/Technology/Futures future of networks in education http://www.serve.com/ephemera/historybuff.html history (USA) stuff http://brainop.media.mit.edu Brain Opera http://www.naacp.org NAACP home site http://ibd.ensamble.com Investor's web daily http://www.yell.co.uk/yell/web.html UK web index http://www.webovision.com/ccgibin/var/media/sd/index.html WeboVison - media http://www.lam.mus.co.us/webmuseums museums on the web http://www.salon999.com Salon ezine http://www.hotbot.com newish search engine http://www.cnet.com/Content/Features/Howto/Netscape/ fine tune Netscape http://www.cnet.com/Gamecenter/Peeks/Five/ preview 5 new games http://www.cnet.com/Gamecenter/Exclusives/Cheater/ game cheat codes The world's first poetry reading in cyberspace took place recently on Saturday, July 13th. The event, sponsored by the Contact Consortium and AlphaWorld, featured blues poetry by JJWebb. It was a great deal of fun and was successful enough that there are discussions afoot for other events of this type. The world's most interesting series of Unix commands. (found on alt.sysadmin.recovery, which gives you an idea why your admin never has enough time to fix the mailserver...) unzip ; touch ; finger ; mount ; gasp ; yes ; umount ; sleep =========================================================================== 12. Recipes I bought some pizza bases for Lydia, since she is crazy about pizza. However have had trouble connecting with her, so decided to keep them for myself. And then had to find ways to use them. So far, have got as far as Ian's Vegetable Pizza: One pizza base tomato paste grated cheese carrot, finely chopped onion, finely chopped garlic, finely chopped green pepper, finely chopped celery, finely chopped; or avocado, mushed. salt, pepper, herbs, spices Did not specify quantities because that will vary by pizza size. Spread a layer of tomato paste on pizza. Cover with a thin layer of cheese. Add thin layers of the vegetables. Cover with a nice layer of cheese. Add salt, pepper, marjoram, basil, thyme, mint, etc to taste. Bake in preheated oven for time required (see instructions with pizza base). =========================================================================== 13. Things to Think About Ian's new theory on why women like bald men: Bald men attract attention. By extension, any women with said bald man will also attract attention. Women like to attract attention. Ergo, women like to be seen with bald men. If almost all men were bald, then the few men with hair would have an advantage. =========================================================================== Sections marked with a '$' are original and CopyLeft 1996 by Ian Douglas. See Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" for explanation of the '$'. The rest is part direct lift from various Net sources, and part paraphrased or directly lifted from various print media. Permission to reproduce is granted as long as source is credited. Back issues available on my web site. To subscribe, send me email. Distribution: F13 is distributed with Rob Fisher's RobList, the List of all South African BBS's, which can be found on all decent SA BBS's, where it is downloaded by hundreds (thousands?) of surfers. RobList can also be found on http://www.lia.co.za F13 is also available as a read-only mailing list on the Internet, with over 245 subscribers in 29 countries at the moment. Current countries represented are: Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malaysia, Mauritania, Mexico, Namibia, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Russia, South Africa, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, Singapore, Trinidad & Tobago, UK, USA. If your country is not listed, please advise me... -------------------------------------------------------------------- iandoug@lia.co.za P.O. Box 484, Sanlamhof 7532, South Africa 36 : 1,73 : 58 : blue : dark brown PGP key available http://www.lia.co.za/users/iandoug Proudly iN*T*j.