fortune-teller 0.1.2 → 0.3.0

package/fortunes/magic

@@ -1,194 +0,0 @@
-A Thaum is the basic unit of magical strength.  It has been universally
-established as the amount of magic needed to create one small white pigeon
-or three normal sized billiard balls.
-		-- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
-%
-"A wizard cannot do everything; a fact most magicians are reticent to admit,
-let alone discuss with prospective clients.  Still, the fact remains that 
-there are certain objects, and people, that are, for one reason or another, 
-completely immune to any direct magical spell.  It is for this group of
-beings that the magician learns the subtleties of using indirect spells.
-It also does no harm, in dealing with these matters, to carry a large club
-near your person at all times."
-		-- The Teachings of Ebenezum, Volume VIII
-%
-An ancient proverb summed it up: when a wizard is tired of looking for
-broken glass in his dinner, it ran, he is tired of life.
-		-- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
-%
-Chaos is King and Magic is loose in the world.
-%
-Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, for they become soggy and hard to
-light.
-
-Do not throw cigarette butts in the urinal, for they are subtle and
-quick to anger.
-%
-"Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, for you are crunchy and good
-with ketchup."
-%
-Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
-		-- Aleister Crowley
-%
-Eight was also the Number of Bel-Shamharoth, which was why a sensible wizard
-would never mention the number if he could avoid it.  Or you'll be eight
-alive, apprentices were jocularly warned.  Bel-Shamharoth was especially
-attracted to dabblers in magic who, by being as it were beachcombers on the
-shores of the unnatural, were already half-enmeshed in his nets.
-Rincewind's room number in his hall of residence had been 7a.  He hadn't
-been surprised.
-		-- Terry Pratchett, "The Sending of Eight"
-%
-"How do you know she is a unicorn?" Molly demanded.  "And why were you afraid
-to let her touch you?  I saw you.  You were afraid of her."
-	"I doubt that I will feel like talking for very long," the cat
-replied without rancor.  "I would not waste time in foolishness if I were 
-you.  As to your first question, no cat out of its first fur can ever be
-deceived by appearances.  Unlike human beings, who enjoy them.  As for your
-second question --"  Here he faltered, and suddenly became very interested
-in washing; nor would he speak until he had licked himself fluffy and then
-licked himself smooth again.  Even then he would not look at Molly, but 
-examined his claws.
-	"If she had touched me," he said very softly, "I would have been
-hers and not my own, not ever again."
-		-- Peter S. Beagle, "The Last Unicorn"
-%
-It is a well known fact that warriors and wizards do not get along, because
-one side considers the other side to be a collection of bloodthirsty idiots
-who can't walk and think at the same time, while the other side is naturally
-suspicious of a body of men who mumble a lot and wear long dresses.  Oh, say
-the wizards, if we're going to be like that, then, what about all those
-studded collars and oiled muscles down at the Young Men's Pagan Association?
-To which the heroes reply, that's a pretty good allegation from a bunch of
-wimpsoes who won't go near a woman on account, can you believe it, of their
-mystical power being sort of drained out.  Right, say the wizards, that just
-about does it, you and your leather posing pouches.  Oh yeah, say the the
-heroes, why don't you ...
-		-- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
-%
-It is well known that *things* from undesirable universes are always seeking
-an entrance into this one, which is the psychic equivalent of handy for the
-buses and closer to the shops.
-		-- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
-%
-	It seems there's this magician working one of the luxury cruise ships
-for a few years.  He doesn't have to change his routines much as the audiences
-change over fairly often, and he's got a good life.   The only problem is the
-ship's parrot, who perches in the hall and watches him night after night, year
-after year.  Finally, the parrot figures out how almost every trick works and
-starts giving it away for the audience.  For example, when the magician makes
-a bouquet of flowers disappear, the parrot squawks "Behind his back!  Behind
-his back!"  Well, the magician is really annoyed at this, but there's not much
-he can do about it as the parrot is a ship's mascot and very popular with the
-passengers.
-	One night, the ship strikes some floating debris, and sinks without
-a trace.  Almost everyone aboard was lost, except for the magician and the
-parrot.  For three days and nights they just drift, with the magician clinging
-to one end of a piece of driftwood and the parrot perched on the other end.
-As the sun rises on the morning of the fourth day, the parrot walks over to
-the magician's end of the log.  With obvious disgust in his voice, he snaps
-"OK, you win, I give up.  Where did you hide the ship?"
-%
-Knowledge is power -- knowledge shared is power lost.
-		-- Aleister Crowley
-%
-Magic is always the best solution -- especially reliable magic.
-%
-No matter how subtle the wizard, a knife in the shoulder blades will seriously
-cramp his style.
-%
-Rincewind had generally been considered by his tutors to be a natural wizard
-in the same way that fish are natural mountaineers.  He probably would have
-been thrown out of Unseen University anyway--he couldn't remember spells and
-smoking made him feel ill.
-		-- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
-%
-Somewhere, just out of sight, the unicorns are gathering.
-%
-The default Magic Word, "Abracadabra", actually is a corruption of the
-Hebrew phrase "ha-Bracha dab'ra" which means "pronounce the blessing".
-%
-"The first rule of magic is simple.  Don't waste your time waving your
-hands and hoping when a rock or a club will do."
-		-- McCloctnik the Lucid
-%
-	The seven eyes of Ningauble the Wizard floated back to his hood as he
-reported to Fafhrd: "I have seen much, yet cannot explain all.  The Gray
-Mouser is exactly twenty-five feet below the deepest cellar in the palace
-of Gilpkerio Kistomerces.  Even though twenty-four parts in twenty-five of
-him are dead, he is alive.
-	"Now about Lankhmar.  She's been invaded, her walls breached
-everywhere and desperate fighting is going on in the streets, by a fierce
-host which out-numbers Lankhamar's inhabitants by fifty to one -- and
-equipped with all modern weapons.  Yet you can save the city."
-	"How?" demanded Fafhrd.
-	Ningauble shrugged.  "You're a hero.  You should know."
-		-- Fritz Leiber, "The Swords of Lankhmar"
-%
-	"Then what is magic for?" Prince Lir demanded wildly.  "What use is
-wizardry if it cannot save a unicorn?"  He gripped the magician's shoulder
-hard, to keep from falling.
-	Schmendrick did not turn his head.  With a touch of sad mockery in
-his voice, he said, "That's what heroes are for."
-...
-	"Yes, of course," he [Prince Lir] said.  "That is exactly what heroes
-are for.  Wizards make no difference, so they say that nothing does, but
-heroes are meant to die for unicorns."
-		-- Peter Beagle, "The Last Unicorn"
-%
-There are those who claim that magic is like the tide; that it swells and
-fades over the surface of the earth, collecting in concentrated pools here
-and there, almost disappearing from other spots, leaving them parched for
-wonder.  There are also those who believe that if you stick your fingers up
-your nose and blow, it will increase your intelligence.
-		-- The Teachings of Ebenezum, Volume VII
-%
-Unseen University had never admitted women, muttering something about
-problems with the plumbing, but the real reason was an unspoken dread that
-if women were allowed to mess around with magic they would probably be
-embarrassingly good at it ...
-		-- Terry Pratchett, "The Light Fantastic"
-%
-Using words to describe magic is like using a screwdriver to cut roast beef.
-		-- Tom Robbins
-%
-	"Verily and forsooth," replied Goodgulf darkly.  "In the past year
-strange and fearful wonders I have seen.  Fields sown with barley reap
-crabgrass and fungus, and even small gardens reject their artichoke hearts.
-There has been a hot day in December and a blue moon.  Calendars are made with
-a month of Sundays and a blue-ribbon Holstein bore alive two insurance
-salesmen.  The earth splits and the entrails of a goat were found tied in
-square knots.  The face of the sun blackens and the skies have rained down
-soggy potato chips."
-	"But what do all these things mean?" gasped Frito.
-	"Beats me," said Goodgulf with a shrug, "but I thought it made good
-copy."
-		-- Harvard Lampoon, "Bored of the Rings"
-%
-Watch Rincewind.
-
-Look at him.  Scrawny, like most wizards, and clad in a dark red robe on
-which a few mystic sigils were embroidered in tarnished sequins. Some might
-have taken him for a mere apprentice enchanter who had run away from his
-master out of defiance, boredom, fear and a lingering taste for
-heterosexuality.  Yet around his neck was a chain bearing the bronze octagon
-that marked him as an alumnus of Unseen University, the high school of magic
-whose time-and-space transcendent campus is never precisely Here or There.
-Graduates were usually destined for mageship at least, but Rincewind--after
-an unfortunate event--had left knowing only one spell and made a living of
-sorts around the town by capitalizing on an innate gift for languages.  He
-avoided work as a rule, but had a quickness of wit that put his
-acquaintances in mind of a bright rodent.
-		-- Terry Pratchett, "The Colour of Magic"
-%
-What is a magician but a practising theorist?
-		-- Obi-Wan Kenobi
-%
-What use is magic if it can't save a unicorn?
-		-- Peter S. Beagle, "The Last Unicorn"
-%
-When I say the magic word to all these people, they will vanish forever.
-I will then say the magic words to you, and you, too, will vanish -- never
-to be seen again.
-		-- Kurt Vonnegut Jr., "Between Time and Timbuktu"
-%

package/fortunes/medicine

@@ -1,423 +0,0 @@
-A CODE OF ETHICAL BEHAVIOR FOR PATIENTS:
-
-1. DO NOT EXPECT YOUR DOCTOR TO SHARE YOUR DISCOMFORT.
-	Involvement with the patient's suffering might cause him to lose
-	valuable scientific objectivity.
-
-2. BE CHEERFUL AT ALL TIMES.
-	Your doctor leads a busy and trying life and requires all the
-	gentleness and reassurance he can get.
-
-3. TRY TO SUFFER FROM THE DISEASE FOR WHICH YOU ARE BEING TREATED.
-	Remember that your doctor has a professional reputation to uphold.
-%
-A CODE OF ETHICAL BEHAVIOR FOR PATIENTS:
-
-4. DO NOT COMPLAIN IF THE TREATMENT FAILS TO BRING RELIEF.
-	You must believe that your doctor has achieved a deep insight into
-	the true nature of your illness, which transcends any mere permanent
-	disability you may have experienced.
-
-5. NEVER ASK YOUR DOCTOR TO EXPLAIN WHAT HE IS DOING OR WHY HE IS DOING IT.
-	It is presumptuous to assume that such profound matters could be
-	explained in terms that you would understand.
-
-6. SUBMIT TO NOVEL EXPERIMANTAL TREATMENT READILY.
-	Though the surgery may not benefit you directly, the resulting
-	research paper will surely be of widespread interest.
-%
-A CODE OF ETHICAL BEHAVIOR FOR PATIENTS:
-
-7. PAY YOUR MEDICAL BILLS PROMPTLY AND WILLINGLY.
-	You should consider it a privilege to contribute, however modestly,
-	to the well-being of physicians and other humanitarians.
-
-8. DO NOT SUFFER FROM AILMENTS THAT YOU CANNOT AFFORD.
-	It is sheer arrogance to contract illnesses that are beyond your means.
-
-9. NEVER REVEAL ANY OF THE SHORTCOMINGS THAT HAVE COME TO LIGHT IN THE COURSE
-   OF TREATMENT BY YOUR DOCTOR.
-	The patient-doctor relationship is a privileged one, and you have a
-	sacred duty to protect him from exposure.
-
-10. NEVER DIE WHILE IN YOUR DOCTOR'S PRESENCE OR UNDER HIS DIRECT CARE.
-	This will only cause him needless inconvenience and embarrassment.
-%
-A distraught patient phoned her doctor's office.  "Was it true," the woman
-inquired, "that the medication the doctor had prescribed was for the rest
-of her life?"
-	She was told that it was.  There was just a moment of silence before
-the woman proceeded bravely on.  "Well, I'm wondering, then, how serious my
-condition is.  This prescription is marked `NO REFILLS'".
-%
-A doctor calls his patient to give him the results of his tests.  "I have
-some bad news," says the doctor, "and some worse news."  The bad news is
-that you only have six weeks to live."
-	"Oh, no," says the patient.  "What could possibly be worse than that?"
-	"Well," the doctor replies, "I've been trying to reach you since
-last Monday."
-%
-A woman physician has made the statement that smoking is neither
-physically defective nor morally degrading, and that nicotine, even
-when indulged to in excess, is less harmful than excessive petting."
-		-- Purdue Exponent, Jan 16, 1925
-%
-A woman went into a hospital one day to give birth.  Afterwards, the doctor
-came to her and said, "I have some... odd news for you."
-	"Is my baby all right?" the woman anxiously asked.
-	"Yes, he is," the doctor replied, "but we don't know how.  Your son
-(we assume) was born with no body.  He only has a head."
-	Well, the doctor was correct.  The Head was alive and well, though no
-one knew how.  The Head turned out to be fairly normal, ignoring his lack of
-a body, and lived for some time as typical a life as could be expected under
-the circumstances.
-	One day, about twenty years after the fateful birth, the woman got a
-phone call from another doctor.  The doctor said, "I have recently perfected
-an operation.  Your son can live a normal life now: we can graft a body onto
-his head!"
-	The woman, practically weeping with joy, thanked the doctor and hung
-up.  She ran up the stairs saying, "Johnny, Johnny, I have a *wonderful*
-surprise for you!"
-	"Oh no," cried The Head, "not another HAT!"
-%
-After his legs had been broken in an accident, Mr. Miller sued for damages, 
-claming that he was crippled and would have to spend the rest of his life
-in a wheelchair.  Although the insurance-company doctor testified that his
-bones had healed properly and that he was fully capable  of walking, the
-judge decided for the plaintiff and awarded him $500,000.
-	When he was wheeled into the insurance office to collect his check,
-Miller was confronted by several executives.  "You're not getting away with
-this, Miller," one said.  "We're going to watch you day and night.  If you
-take a single step, you'll not only repay the damages but stand trial for
-perjury.  Here's the money.  What do you intend to do with it?"
-	"My wife and I are going to travel," Miller replied.  "We'll go to
-Stockholm, Berlin, Rome, Athens and, finally, to a place called Lourdes --
-where, gentlemen, you'll see yourselves one hell of a miracle."
-%
-After twelve years of therapy my psychiatrist said something that
-brought tears to my eyes.  He said, "No hablo ingles."
-		-- Ronnie Shakes
-%
-Anyone who goes to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined.
-		-- Samuel Goldwyn
-%
-Aquavit is also considered useful for medicinal purposes, an essential
-ingredient in what I was once told is the Norwegian cure for the common
-cold.  You get a bottle, a poster bed, and the brightest colored stocking
-cap you can find.  You put the cap on the post at the foot of the bed,
-then get into bed and drink aquavit until you can't see the cap.  I've
-never tried this, but it sounds as though it should work.
-		-- Peter Nelson
-%
-	As a general rule of thumb, never trust anybody who's been in therapy
-for more than 15 percent of their life span.  The words "I am sorry" and "I
-am wrong" will have totally disappeared from their vocabulary.  They will stab
-you, shoot you, break things in your apartment, say horrible things to your
-friends and family, and then justify this abhorrent behavior by saying:
-"Sure, I put your dog in the microwave.  But I feel *better* for doing it."
-		-- Bruce Feirstein, "Nice Guys Sleep Alone"
-%
-At the hospital, a doctor is training an intern on how to announce bad news
-to the patients.  The doctor tells the intern "This man in 305 is going to
-die in six months.  Go in and tell him."  The intern boldly walks into the
-room, over to the man's bedisde and tells him "Seems like you're gonna die!"
-The man has a heart attack and is rushed into surgery on the spot.  The doctor
-grabs the intern and screams at him, "What!?!? are you some kind of moron?
-You've got to take it easy, work your way up to the subject.  Now this man in
-213 has about a week to live.  Go in and tell him, but, gently, you hear me,
-gently!"
-	The intern goes softly into the room, humming to himself, cheerily
-opens the drapes to let the sun in, walks over to the man's bedside, fluffs
-his pillow and wishes him a "Good morning!"  "Wonderful day, no?  Say...
-guess who's going to die soon!"
-%
-Be a better psychiatrist and the world will beat a psychopath to your door.
-%
-Better to use medicines at the outset than at the last moment.
-%
-Certain old men prefer to rise at dawn, taking a cold bath and a long
-walk with an empty stomach and otherwise mortifying the flesh.  They
-then point with pride to these practices as the cause of their sturdy
-health and ripe years; the truth being that they are hearty and old,
-not because of their habits, but in spite of them.  The reason we find
-only robust persons doing this thing is that it has killed all the
-others who have tried it.
-		-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
-%
-Cure the disease and kill the patient.
-		-- Francis Bacon
-%
-Death has been proven to be 99% fatal in laboratory rats.
-%
-Dental health is next to mental health.
-%
-Ever notice that the word "therapist" breaks down into "the rapist"?
-Simple coincidence?
-Maybe...
-%
-For my son, Robert, this is proving to be the high-point of his entire life
-to date.  He has had his pajamas on for two, maybe three days now.  He has
-the sense of joyful independence a 5-year-old child gets when he suddenly
-realizes that he could be operating an acetylene torch in the coat closet
-and neither parent [because of the flu] would have the strength to object.
-He has been foraging for his own food, which means his diet consists
-entirely of "food" substances which are advertised only on Saturday-morning
-cartoon shows; substances that are the color of jukebox lights and that, for
-legal reasons, have their names spelled wrong, as in New Creemy
-Chok-'n'-Cheez Lumps o' Froot ("part of this complete breakfast").
-		-- Dave Barry, "Molecular Homicide"
-%
-Fortune's Exercising Truths:
-
-1:  Richard Simmons gets paid to exercise like a lunatic.  You don't.
-2.  Aerobic exercises stimulate and speed up the heart.  So do heart attacks.
-3.  Exercising around small children can scar them emotionally for life.
-4.  Sweating like a pig and gasping for breath is not refreshing.
-5.  No matter what anyone tells you, isometric exercises cannot be done
-    quietly at your desk at work.  People will suspect manic tendencies as
-    you twitter around in your chair.
-6.  Next to burying bones, the thing a dog enjoys mosts is tripping joggers.
-7.  Locking four people in a tiny, cement-walled room so they can run around
-    for an hour smashing a little rubber ball -- and each other -- with a hard
-    racket should immediately be recognized for what it is: a form of insanity.
-8.  Fifty push-ups, followed by thirty sit-ups, followed by ten chin-ups,
-    followed by one throw-up.
-9.  Any activity that can't be done while smoking should be avoided.
-%
-[From an announcement of a congress of the International Ontopsychology
-Association, in Rome]:
-
-The Ontopsychological school, availing itself of new research criteria and
-of a new telematic epistemology, maintains that social modes do not spring
-from dialectics of territory or of class, or of consumer goods, or of means
-of power, but rather from dynamic latencies capillarized in millions of
-individuals in system functions which, once they have reached the event
-maturation, burst forth in catastrophic phenomenology engaging a suitable
-stereotype protagonist or duty marionette (general, president, political
-party, etc.) to consummate the act of social schizophrenia in mass genocide.
-%
-God is dead and I don't feel all too well either....
-		-- Ralph Moonen
-%
-"Good health" is merely the slowest rate at which one can die.
-%
-Happiness is good health and a bad memory.
-		-- Ingrid Bergman
-%
-Health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.
-%
-Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying
-of nothing.
-		-- Redd Foxx
-%
-His ideas of first-aid stopped short of squirting soda water.
-		-- P.G. Wodehouse
-%
-Human cardiac catheterization was introduced by Werner Forssman in 1929.
-Ignoring his department chief, and tying his assistant to an operating
-table to prevent her interference, he placed a ureteral catheter into
-a vein in his arm, advanced it to the right atrium [of his heart], and
-walked upstairs to the x-ray department where he took the confirmatory
-x-ray film.  In 1956, Dr. Forssman was awarded the Nobel Prize.
-%
-I get my exercise acting as pallbearer to my friends who exercise.
-		-- Chauncey Depew
-%
-I got the bill for my surgery.  Now I know what those doctors were
-wearing masks for.
-		-- James Boren
-%
-	"I keep seeing spots in front of my eyes."
-	"Did you ever see a doctor?"
-	"No, just spots."
-%
-If a person (a) is poorly, (b) receives treatment intended to make him better,
-and (c) gets better, then no power of reasoning known to medical science can
-convince him that it may not have been the treatment that restored his health.
-		-- Sir Peter Medawar, "The Art of the Soluble"
-%
-	If I kiss you, that is an psychological interaction.
-	On the other hand, if I hit you over the head with a brick,
-that is also a psychological interaction.
-	The difference is that one is friendly and the other is not
-so friendly.
-	The crucial point is if you can tell which is which.
-		-- Dolph Sharp, "I'm O.K., You're Not So Hot"
-%
-If you look like your driver's license photo -- see a doctor.
-If you look like your passport photo -- it's too late for a doctor.
-%
-It is very vulgar to talk like a dentist when one isn't a dentist.
-It produces a false impression.
-		-- Oscar Wilde.
-%
-It's no longer a question of staying healthy.  It's a question of finding
-a sickness you like.
-		-- Jackie Mason
-%
-It's not reality or how you perceive things that's important -- it's
-what you're taking for it...
-%
-Just because your doctor has a name for your condition doesn't mean he
-knows what it is.
-%
-Laetrile is the pits.
-%
-My doctorate's in Literature, but it seems like a pretty good pulse to me.
-%
-Neurotics build castles in the sky,
-Psychotics live in them,
-And psychiatrists collect the rent.
-%
-Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died.
-		-- Erma Bombeck
-%
-New England Life, of course.  Why do you ask?
-%
-	page 46
-...a report citing a study by Dr. Thomas C. Chalmers, of the Mount Sinai
-Medical Center in New York, which compared two groups that were being used
-to test the theory that ascorbic acid is a cold preventative.  "The group
-on placebo who thought they were on ascorbic acid," says Dr. Chalmers,
-"had fewer colds than the group on ascorbic acid who thought they were
-on placebo."
-	page 56
-The placebo is proof that there is no real separation between mind and body.
-Illness is always an interaction between both.  It can begin in the mind and
-affect the body, or it can begin in the body and affect the mind, both of
-which are served by the same bloodstream.  Attempts to treat most mental
-diseases as though they were completely free of physical causes and attempts
-to treat most bodily diseases as though the mind were in no way involved must
-be considered archaic in the light of new evidence about the way the human
-body functions.
-		-- Norman Cousins,
-		"Anatomy of an Illness as Perceived by the Patient"
-%
-Paralysis through analysis.
-%
-Proper treatment will cure a cold in seven days, but left to itself,
-a cold will hang on for a week.
-		-- Darrell Huff
-%
-Psychiatry enables us to correct our faults by confessing our parents'
-shortcomings.
-		-- Laurence J. Peter, "Peter's Principles"
-%
-Psychoanalysis is that mental illness for which it regards itself a therapy.
-		-- Karl Kraus
-
-Psychiatry is the care of the id by the odd.
-
-Show me a sane man and I will cure him for you.
-		-- C.G. Jung
-%
-Psychology.  Mind over matter.  Mind under matter?  It doesn't matter.
-Never mind.
-%
-Pushing 30 is exercise enough.
-%
-Pushing 40 is exercise enough.
-%
-Quit worrying about your health.  It'll go away.
-		-- Robert Orben
-%
-Sigmund's wife wore Freudian slips.
-%
-Some people need a good imaginary cure for their painful imaginary ailment.
-%
-Sometimes the best medicine is to stop taking something.
-%
-Straw?  No, too stupid a fad.  I put soot on warts.
-%
-Stress has been pinpointed as a major cause of illness.  To avoid overload
-and burnout, keep stress out of your life.  Give it to others instead.  Learn
-the "Gaslight" treatment, the "Are you talking to me?" technique, and the
-"Do you feel okay?  You look pale." approach.  Start with negotiation and
-implication.  Advance to manipulation and humiliation.  Above all, relax
-and have a nice day.
-%
-The 80's -- when you can't tell hairstyles from chemotherapy.
-%
-"... the Mayo Clinic, named after its founder, Dr. Ted Clinic ..."
-		-- Dave Barry
-%
-"The molars, I'm sure, will be all right, the molars can take care of
-themselves," the old man said, no longer to me.  "But what will become 
-of the bicuspids?"
-		-- The Old Man and his Bridge
-%
-The New England Journal of Medicine reports that 9 out of 10 doctors agree
-that 1 out of 10 doctors is an idiot.
-%
-The real reason psychology is hard is that psychologists are trying to
-do the impossible.
-%
-The reason they're called wisdom teeth is that the experience makes you wise.
-%
-The secret of healthy hitchhiking is to eat junk food.
-%
-The trouble with heart disease is that the first symptom is often hard to
-deal with: death.
-		-- Michael Phelps
-%
-The Vet Who Surprised A Cow
-	In the course of his duties in August 1977, a Dutch veterinary
-surgeon was required to treat an ailing cow.  To investigate its internal
-gases he inserted a tube into that end of the animal not capable of facial
-expression and struck a match.  The jet of flame set fire first to some
-bales of hay and then to the whole farm causing damage estimate at L45,000. 
-The vet was later fined L140 for starting a fire in a manner surprising to
-the magistrates.  The cow escaped with shock.
-		-- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic Failures"
-%
-We have the flu.  I don't know if this particular strain has an official
-name, but if it does, it must be something like "Martian Death Flu".  You
-may have had it yourself.  The main symptom is that you wish you had another
-setting on your electric blanket, up past "HIGH", that said "ELECTROCUTION".
-	Another symptom is that you cease brushing your teeth, because (a)
-your teeth hurt, and (b) you lack the strength.  Midway through the brushing
-process, you'd have to lie down in front of the sink to rest for a couple
-of hours, and rivulets of toothpaste foam would dribble sideways out of your
-mouth, eventually hardening into crusty little toothpaste stalagmites that
-would bond your head permanently to the bathroom floor, which is how the
-police would find you.
-	You know the kind of flu I'm talking about.
-		-- Dave Barry, "Molecular Homicide"
-%
-	"Welcome back for you 13th consecutive week, Evelyn.  Evelyn, will
-you go into the auto-suggestion booth and take your regular place on the
-psycho-prompter couch?"
-	"Thank you, Red."
-	"Now, Evelyn, last week you went up to $40,000 by properly citing
-your rivalry with your sibling as a compulsive sado-masochistic behavior
-pattern which developed out of an early post-natal feeding problem."
-	"Yes, Red."
-	"But -- later, when asked about pre-adolescent oedipal phantasy
-repressions, you rationalized twice and mental blocked three times.  Now,
-at $300 per rationalization and $500 per mental block you lost $2,100 off
-your $40,000 leaving you with a total of $37,900.  Now, any combination of
-two more mental blocks and either one rationalization or three defensive
-projections will put you out of the game.  Are you willing to go ahead?"
-	"Yes, Red."
-	"I might say here that all of Evelyn's questions and answers have
-been checked for accuracy with her analyst.  Now, Evelyn, for $80,000
-explain the failure of your three marriages."
-	"Well, I--"
-	"We'll get back to Evelyn in one minute.  First a word about our
-product."
-		-- Jules Feiffer
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-When a lot of remedies are suggested for a disease, that means it can't
-be cured.
-		-- Anton Chekhov, "The Cherry Orchard"
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-Your digestive system is your body's Fun House, whereby food goes on a long,
-dark, scary ride, taking all kinds of unexpected twists and turns, being
-attacked by vicious secretions along the way, and not knowing until the last
-minute whether it will be turned into a useful body part or ejected into the
-Dark Hole by Mister Sphincter.  We Americans live in a nation where the
-medical-care system is second to none in the world, unless you count maybe
-25 or 30 little scuzzball countries like Scotland that we could vaporize in
-seconds if we felt like it.
-		-- Dave Barry, "Stay Fit & Healthy Until You're Dead"
-%