Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Pastimes : Laughter is the Best Medicine - Tell us a joke -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: SIer formerly known as Joe B. who wrote (13802)	3/15/2000 10:58:00 PM
From: Paul K	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 62558

Five surgeons are discussing who makes the best patients to operate on. The first surgeon says, "I like to see accountants on my operating table, because when you open them up, everything inside is numbered." The second responds, "Yeah, but you should try electricians! Everything inside them is color coded." The third surgeon says, "No, I really think librarians are the best; everything inside them is in alphabetical order." The fourth surgeon chimes in: "You know, I like construction workers... those guys always understand when you have a few parts left over at the end, and when the job takes longer than you said it would." But the fifth surgeon shut them all up when he observed: "You're all wrong. Market Makers are the easiest to operate on. There's no guts, no heart, and no spine, and the head and butt are interchangeable."

To: SIer formerly known as Joe B. who wrote (13802)	3/16/2000 7:47:00 AM
From: John Carragher	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 62558

The Corporate Mind > ------------------ > > Here is a look into the corporate mind that is very interesting, > educational, historical, completely true, and hysterical all at the > same time: > > The US standard railroad gauge (width between the two rails) is 4 > feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge > used? > > Because that's the way they built them in England, and the US > railroads were built by English expatriates. > > Why did the English build them like that? Because the first rail lines > were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and > that's the gauge they used. > > Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the > tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building > wagons which used that wheel spacing. > > Okay! Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? > Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would > break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because > that's the spacing of the wheel ruts. > > So who built those old rutted roads? The first long distance roads in > Europe (and England) were built by Imperial Rome for their legions. > The roads have been used ever since. And the ruts in the roads? Roman > war chariots first formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to > match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots > were made for (or by) Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter > of wheel spacing. The United States standard railroad gauge of 4 > feet, 8.5 inches derives from the original specification for an > Imperial Roman war chariot. Specifications and bureaucracies live > forever. So the next time you are handed a specification and wonder > what horse's ass came up with it, you may be exactly right, because > the Imperial Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to > accommodate the back ends of two war horses. Thus, we have the answer > to the original question. > > Now the twist to the story.............. > > There's an interesting extension to the story about railroad gauges > and horses' behinds. When we see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch > pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the > main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are > made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah. The engineers who designed > the SRBs might have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs > had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The > railroad line from the factory had to run through a tunnel in the > mountains. The SRBs had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is > slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track is > about as wide as two horses' behinds. So, the major design feature of > what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was > determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a Horse's Ass!